


The Hopes and Fears of All the Years

by 20SomethingSuperHeroes



Category: A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Characters Watching Star Wars, Childhood Memories, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Music, Christmas Party, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Clint Needs a Hug, Crossover, Dreams and Nightmares, F/M, Harry Potter References, Kid Pietro Maximoff, Maximoff Twin Feels, Memories, Multiple Crossovers, POV Multiple, Pre-Captain America: Civil War, Prophetic Dreams, SHIELD, Star Wars: The Force Awakens Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-17
Updated: 2016-02-17
Packaged: 2018-05-21 06:22:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 53,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6041470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/20SomethingSuperHeroes/pseuds/20SomethingSuperHeroes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wanda Maximoff is looking forward to her first Christmas as an Avenger.  She plans to watch the new Star Wars movie with her friends and spend the holidays with the Barton family.  If she can squeeze in a few minutes between Christmas parties and avenging, she may even finish reading the Harry Potter books.  For once, she has the chance to just relax and pretend to be a normal person.  If only she could stop having nightmares about her past--or the future.</p><p>Setting: the Christmas after Ultron</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hopes and Fears of All the Years

Phil Coulson had been back in Washington, D.C. three days when Hedwig finally returned. He let her stay home and sleep in his apartment for two more. As it was, he didn’t have anything for her to do at the moment. 

The first weekend of December, Coulson took Hedwig out to a park to go flying. They were both in fairly good spirits, looking forward to the fresh air and exercise. It was a cold morning with a few wispy clouds on the edge of the sky. It had snowed a few days earlier but most of it had melted, leaving patches of white over the brown grass. Coulson let Hedwig off his wrist to go fly in circles over the lawn while he stood and watched her. 

In the distance he heard someone calling his name and running towards him. He turned around.

“Coulson!” 

She was a tall, lanky woman with hair that fell out of a knitted beanie in yellow ringlets, wearing a windbreaker and boots. He had difficulty placing her face for a moment.

“Remember me?”

He recognized the voice.

“Sharon Carter!”

“Yeah!”

“How are you?”

“Doing good,” she said, smiling brightly as she caught her breath. They shook hands.

“So you’re still around? I had no idea you were in D.C.”

“Actually, I’ve moved to New York. I’m living in Queens,” said Sharon. “But I’ve come back to visit some friends. Take some time off.”

“How’s the CIA treating you?” 

Sharon sighed. “A lot less exciting. I’m mostly doing desk work these days. But they like having me. I’m paid pretty well. Not complaining. I hear you’re the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. now?”

“Yep.”

“How’s that been going?”

“Rough. I’ve been in and out of D.C. trying to straighten things out. I spent Thanksgiving in Arizona, actually. Hy--there’s been some interesting things happening there.”

Sharon nodded. “We heard about it. And are you working with the new Avengers?”

“I have been, actually. Quite a bit more than I thought I would. But Cap likes to stay involved when Hydra’s on the radar--you know how he is.”

Sharon smiled. “A lot of people at my work aren’t too fond of what he’s doing.”

“But you are?”

Sharon shrugged. “I’m the one who ends up mouthing off when people are saying Hydra isn’t really a threat. They shut up pretty quickly.”

Coulson laughed. “You keep telling them.” He looked off to one side and saw Hedwig approaching. He held out his hand for her to perch.

“There you are, how was that?” he said, stroking her. Hedwig glanced over at Sharon.

“Sharon, this is Hedwig.”

“Oh hi,” said Sharon. She raised her gloved hand as though to touch her. “Do you mind if I?”

“Go right ahead.” Sharon stroked Hedwig gently on the side of the head. “She’s so pretty. And you named her after Harry Potter’s owl?”

Coulson looked at her. “Can you keep a secret?”

“What? She is Harry Potter’s owl?”

Coulson laughed. “Yeah.” 

“What happened?”

“The T96 serum. It’s the same stuff they used on me. But she’s making the best of it. We both are.”

“Wow,” said Sharon. “Okay. That’s good to hear.” She laughed as she continued stroking Hedwig. Hedwig looked up at her approvingly. “I’m just amazed that it turns out that Harry Potter’s a true story.”

“You learn every day.”

“Well, I’ve got to be going, I guess I’ll see you around, Coulson.”

“All right, bye. Oh, and Merry Christmas!”

“You too!” Sharon called back, waving as she ran back the way she had come, Coulson and Hedwig both watching her.

 

She was in an office somewhere. If it was the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters in D.C. or somewhere in the Avengers’ base she would have recognized it. Or maybe it was one of these places and her brain had just jumbled the details. But the world was spinning, left and right, up one angle and down another. She could not steady herself on her own. And when the world finally settled, she thought she could see some kind of a fog around and in between the people in the room. Maybe the room itself was blurring out of focus while she could see only the people clearly.

She wasn’t sure how many people were in the room. In the background she thought maybe she could see Nick Fury. But directly in front of her were Phil Coulson and Hillary Tanner. Wanda couldn’t hear what they were saying. But they both sounded distressed. In fact, they were arguing. Nick Fury walked up from the background, waving his arms at both of them in frustration and yelling.

Coulson turned sadly to look at Hillary. “I’m afraid he’s right, Hillary. There’s nothing we can do.”

“But do you really want to do nothing?” Hillary shouted in Coulson’s face. 

“Can you--can either of you just allow this to happen? We have to stop this!”

Nick Fury glared at Hillary with his good eye and folded his arms. He shook his head. Whatever it was he said next, Hillary didn’t like it.

“No, I’m sorry,” said Hillary finally. She began to walk away from them. “I can’t take no for an answer.”

“Hillary, you get back here, now!” Coulson lunged and grabbed her by the arms. Hillary tried to wrestle herself out of his grip. Nick Fury came up from behind to restrain her.

“No, you guys can’t do this! I’m not going to sit here and watch while my friends kill each other!”

 

Hillary’s plea echoed in Wanda’s ears as she slowly awoke the next morning. It was Sunday. It was snowing outside, but only very lightly, with stray flakes drifting slowly down through the air. 

Later in the morning she went for a walk through the neighborhood and the park, keeping her hands stuffed in the pockets of her new red coat, watching the snowflakes continue to drift around her. 

There was definitely something to these dreams she was having. Twice she felt she could ignore them. Three times...she was getting worried. They couldn’t be events happening in the present. She had checked Facebook that morning and Hillary was going out for hot chocolate with Mitch and Coulson. 

Either they were just dreams, or they were real. And Wanda was starting to believe they were real.

But she was afraid to ask for help. If she went to talk to someone at the Avengers’ headquarters--Selvig, Doctor Cho, the medic, any of their experts on hand--they would most likely report it to Cap. And then Cap would have to confront her and ask what was bothering her.

And she was afraid of what would happen if she did speak up. Would they tell her that her dreams definitely were predictions of the future? Would they tell her that they were nothing to worry about and that her powers were acting up? Or would whoever she asked for help say they had no idea what they were or how to help her? And which answer was she afraid of the most?

She wondered if she could tell Vision? Both of their powers were sourced from the Mind Gem in his forehead. It was part of the fabric of the Universe--perhaps the part of it that was in her was trying to warn her. 

There was nothing she could do about it, she concluded when she returned to her apartment. So it wasn’t worth worrying about. 

When she walked into her apartment, Natasha was in the living room, pulling on a brown leather coat. She was already wearing a hat.

“Going somewhere?” Wanda asked her.

“Yes, and you’re coming with me, aren’t you?”

“Where are we going?”

“Christmas shopping,” said Natasha. “Brown’s is having a sale on live Christmas trees.”

“Oh. All right. Let me get my purse.”

“And leave your coat on. I’ll go start the car.”

Wanda met Natasha outside and got into the passenger seat of their car. The heat was starting to come on. Natasha turned on the radio and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” came on.

“So you think we should get a live tree, then?”

“I figured, we might as well take what we can get. Besides, they’re going for cheap. The big ones aren’t more than a hundred dollars. It’s a Sunday so there might not be too many people trying to get one. We can grab one before everyone else does.”

The next song to come on the radio was “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.” When they got to Brown’s grocery store on Main Street, they saw a large section of the parking lot had been cordoned off to make room for a fenced enclosure brimming with tall conifer trees. There were only a handful of cars parked around it. When they reached the inside of the enclosure, they saw a few people here and there walking among the trees and looking it over. The gate was watched by a scruffy man in glasses wearing a plaid jacket and a leather vest. They nodded at him and walked forward.

It was like being in a forest, except the trees were too low and too close together. They kept bumping into people every time they turned corners, sometimes startling them and mostly awkwardly exchanging “excuse me”s. They did see Dr. Selvig there, examining a very tall tree, and they quietly exchanged greetings and moved along. It seemed like there was some unspoken rule against talking loudly in the tree lot.

“So what kind of a tree do we want?” asked Natasha. “Not a tall one, right?” 

“Right,” said Wanda, craning her neck to look at the top of a very tall and handsome tree. “That one would hardly fit in our apartment. Let’s get a short one.”

“Agreed.” Natasha stepped forward and looked both ways. “Here’s a shorter one. What do you think?”

“Hm?” Wanda put her hand on her chin. The tree Natasha was eyeing was nearly as tall as she was and somewhat skinny at the top. 

“I don’t know if I like this one. If we want a tree that we can put ornaments on, then perhaps I would like one with wider branches on the top. So when we decorate it then it looks more even.” She gestured with her hands.

“I get it,” Natasha nodded.

“How much is that one, anyway?”

Natasha bent down to look at the big green paper tag. “Sheesh. Seventy dollars for that thing? I wouldn’t have asked that much for it.”

“Let’s keep walking.”

“Agreed.”

They reached the back of the tree pen. Somewhere near the opposite corner a tree stood out to them, about four feet high and its shape very rounded, the branches wide almost to the top.

“What do you think of this one?” asked Wanda.

Natasha almost laughed. “It almost looks like someone took a tree and cut it in half.”

“Now, Natasha, it is not that ugly.” Wanda bent down to read the price tag. “Forty dollars. A really good bargain.”

“Let’s take it,” said Natasha. Wanda removed the tag.

They walked back to the front of the tree lot to the man sitting at the gate. The man looked at the tag and took their money. Natasha chatted with him about where he got his trees from and how long he’d been in the business. Wanda noticed a sign that said that the trees were from a farm that always replaced what it cut and that was environmentally sustainable. Still talking, the man got up from his bench and followed them to take the tree from its corner. 

“By the way, are you two girls from the Avengers?” he asked.

“Uh-huh,” said Wanda.

“Nice. You two staying around for Christmas?”

“Not really. We’re going to our friend’s in Indiana for the holidays,” said Natasha. “The tree is for our apartment.”

“Oh. Well, it’ll be nice to have something for you to decorate.” He looked at Wanda. “Are you the girlie from Sokovia?”

“Mm-hm, yes,” said Wanda, nodding.

“Do they do Christmas trees in Sokovia?”

Wanda’s face fell. She didn’t recall, actually. Hydra certainly hadn’t. And then she and Pietro when they had shared an apartment in their teenage had never been able to afford one. “Eh...some people do,” said Wanda. “They’re a very American thing, Christmas trees are. Or Western, probably is the better word.”

The tree salesman smiled warmly and laughed. “That’s all right. There’s a first time for everything.”

They picked up the tree, Natasha and Wanda carrying the upper trunk and branches and the man hefting the bottom. For its small size, the tree was actually rather heavy. The branches loaded with their tiny needles were bulky and hard to carry, tickling Wanda’s face and the smell making her sniff uncomfortably. As they passed the gate they saw someone else waiting by the cash box to pay for a tree. The salesman told them he would be right back. They carried the tree to Natasha and Wanda’s car.

“You got straps for this thing?”

“In the back,” said Natasha, grunting with the effort of carrying the tree. They moved right up to the side of the car. Natasha and the salesman tried to heave the tree onto the roof but they couldn’t quite lift it far enough.

“I can move this,” said Wanda. She triggered her powers to raise the tree out of her friends’ arms and up onto the roof of the car. The tree salesman watched, impressed. 

“Well, that’s one way to use your superpowers,” said the salesman, laughing as Natasha and Wanda both brushed pine needles off of their coats. “I thought you were gonna call your friend the Captain.”

“He knows we can take care of ourselves.”

“Well, I’m sure he does,” said the man. 

Natasha asked the tree salesman about how to care for their tree. He gave them some instructions, and when he left he waved to them and returned inside of the tree lot.

“Well, he’s a nice guy,” said Natasha.

“So what do we do next?”

“Well, we get some straps around this tree so we can drive it home.” Natasha opened the car trunk with her key remote. From inside she grabbed a stack of thick cloth straps. She and Wanda opened the car doors so they could loop the straps around the tree and fasten them under the car roof. 

With their Christmas tree secured, Wanda and Natasha got into the car to drive across the parking lot to Brown’s Market. They picked up some milk and a few other groceries, but   
Natasha stopped by the small gardening section to buy a stand for the tree. The one they picked out had screws that held the tree in place as well as a dish for watering it. 

Brown’s Market had a small seasonal section, but their Christmas decorations weren’t really much to look at, just plastic balls and baubles that Natasha didn’t like very much. They did, however, pick out a long string of red tinsel, another package of plastic beads, and two boxes of lights, one white and the other red and green. 

“Jingle Bell Rock” blared over the radio as they drove home. When they pulled up, Natasha and Wanda got their groceries out first and put them away, sitting the Christmas supplies on the couch. Then they unstrapped the Christmas tree from the car.

“Are you sure you don’t want to carry the tree into the apartment like a normal person would?” Natasha asked her as she turned to return to the apartment.

“Yes, I’m sure,” said Wanda. “This will be much less messy.” 

“All right.” Natasha climbed up the stairs and looked down at Wanda from the balcony. “When you’re ready.”

“Could you open the door, please?” Wanda asked. Natasha opened the door behind her and moved out of the way. Wanda levitated the tree off the car roof and up to the third floor, moving it precariously over the balcony through the door. She watched with grim concentration, holding her hands close to her face as she tweaked her fingers to manipulate the energy. The tree landed on the living room floor with a soft rustle.

“Hm, that wasn’t so bad,” said Natasha. 

“Wasn’t so bad?” asked Wanda, incredulous. 

When Wanda got inside, they removed their coats.The first thing they did was move their couches to make room for their Christmas tree in the corner by the window. They set up the stand and then carefully placed the tree inside of it. They put newspapers on the floor to accommodate for the mess (it was already shedding needles prolifically). Then they put the white lights on the tree, slowly wrapping the cable around the the trunks. They put too much of the cord around the lower branches and ran out of lights about halfway, so they unwrapped the light string and started to wrap the lights again at larger intervals. This time, the lights fit, the bulb on the very end of it sticking out right next to the top.

“Perfect,” said Natasha. “Now I need a break.”

“Me too,” said Wanda. Natasha turned on the coffee maker and they both had steaming mugs of coffee. While they drank, they looked at their work so far and considered how to decorate next.

“I think we should put those other lights on the window,” said Natasha.

“I agree,” said Wanda. “Do you want to go ahead and put the beads on the tree?”

“We might as well,” said Natasha. “It’d give us something to work around.”

Natasha went to her room to get out an extra set of plugs for the lights. Then the two lady Avengers got working on the red and green lights, stringing them in the window. There were already two hooks in the corners, but Natasha also got out the packing tape so they would stick, fixing the middle of the string and the sides. When they plugged in the lights, they blinked back and forth, and the effect with the white tree lights was dazzling.

“I think our tree needs some color, though,” said Natasha, and Wanda agreed. They removed the paper tag from the plastic red tinsel and started to drape the endless string around the branches. This done, they added the beads, crisscrossing them with the tinsel. 

They stood back to look it over when they were finished. 

“It’s a start,” said Wanda. “Do you want to get out the ornaments we got in Arizona?”

“No, not yet,” said Natasha. “Let’s wait until we have a few more. Do you want to go shopping in Whitehall tomorrow after work?”

“Sure. I’m game.”

“So what do you think our tree needs?”

“Well, something to go on the top,” said Wanda. “A star, maybe. A silver one.”

“Okay, then.”

“Maybe some silver beads to go with the red ones.”

“We could look.” The tree right now was overwhelmingly red. Wanda wanted lots of silver ornaments. But for now, she and Wanda could enjoy the gentle glow of the lights over another cup of coffee.

 

The next day, Captain America had an announcement for his team.

“Maria Hill has booked an entire screen at the Corinth movie theater for an opening night showing of Star Wars,” Steve said.

“Whoo-hoo!” said Sam Wilson, clapping.

“All right,” said Rhodey.

“Is it for just us?” asked Natasha.

“Oh, no, it’s for us and whoever else on the Avengers’ staff wants to come,” said Steve. “If you have any friends from town, you’re more than welcome to invite them, too, but priority seating does go to people who work on the base.”

“Is the seating pre-arranged?” asked Vision.

“It’s not, actually,” said Steve. “It’s how the Corinth theater usually does it, seats are first come, first serve. But they do need a headcount to see how many are going to be there. There’s a hundred and fifty seats in the room."

“Well, count me in,” said Rhodey, raising his hand.

“Me too,” said Sam, smiling. All six of the Avengers were planning on coming. Rhodey asked to invite a couple of his military friends. 

“And do you have anyone you’re planning to invite, Steve?” Natasha asked.

“Not that I know of,” said Steve, smiling at her.

Wanda hadn’t been that excited to see Star Wars before then, but now that she knew she was going to be seeing it with friends, she could barely contain her excitement. On the drive to Whitehall with Natasha that evening, Wanda talked to Natasha about her speculation about the plot.

“You’ve given a lot of thought to this. I thought you weren’t that big of a fan,” Natasha observed.

“No, I’m...I’m just curious to see what will happen,” said Wanda. “I mean, I didn’t like the Prequels that much. I guess the original trilogy was okay. I don’t know what all the fuss is about.”

“The prequels aren’t going to be important to this,” said Natasha. “At least, I doubt it.”

Wanda shrugged.

There was something about Episode VII that Natasha was wondering about though. Wanda waited for her to speak. But Natasha remained silent for a minute.

“I wonder if…” Natasha said, sort of gazing off into the distance. But she straightened herself. “Never mind.”

“What?” asked Wanda.

“I’ll explain it to you sometime.” Natasha didn’t like talking while driving very much.

The bustling town of Whitehall, New York, was twice the size of Corinth and had more of the national chain stores like J.C. Penny and Hobby Lobby and Sears’. Natasha took them to Target. Target usually had nice Christmas stuff at reasonable prices, Natasha said, and Natasha wanted to look at getting some more presents for the Barton children. So they went to look at the toys and the books before getting around to the Christmas decor. Natasha got an Elsa dress for Lila in the largest size possible, since Laura had told her that Lila was starting to get taller.

“I don’t know how long she’s going to be able to fit into that,” said Natasha.

In the book section they got several of the books that Cooper had asked for. And then they went to the seasonal decor section. Target had a gorgeous array of ornaments in every size, shape, and color. Wanda was not disappointed in their selection of red and silver. 

Natasha looked over a box of assorted red balls and baubles. “These are much nicer than the ones at Brown’s,” was the verdict, and she placed the box in the cart. She also got a box of the same assortment in silver. Wanda looked over the tree-toppers. The angels were gorgeous, but they didn’t want something quite that heavy. She found a silver star made of wire and covered with glitter that was just perfect. Natasha found icicles and snowflakes in white and silver, some solid and others glittery. Looking at the miscellaneous ornaments further down the aisle, Natasha was drawn to a red and silver-striped elongated bulb. Wanda was enchanted by the little birds, made from foam with bead eyes and faux feathers. She got two cardinals for herself and two doves for Natasha. Natasha also liked a silvery plastic peacock with a tail made of plastic jewels. Wanda gasped aloud when she saw a white owl with wide eyes.

“What, it’s not Hedwig,” said Natasha.  
“It reminds me of Hedwig,” said Wanda. The owl had faux feathers on its wings and tail and there were patches of silver on its breast. It was perfect. Wanda added it to the cart.

The tree is going to be so beautiful, she thought. 

“What other decorations should we get for the apartment, aside from the tree?”

“Well, I would like a wreath,” said Natasha. “And a table centerpiece for the kitchen. And another one for the coffee table.”

Walking further down the aisle, they came across the larger household decorations. In vogue this year were small, solid cones in gaudy colors that looked like miniature trees.   
Natasha and Wanda both liked a one-foot tree that was made from a wire frame painted green and covered with metallic plastic bulbs. It was a touch clownish but it had an interesting aesthetic to it.

“What do you think for this one?” Natasha asked, picking it up.

“I’d say we put it in the kitchen,” said Wanda.

“All right, then,” said Natasha, placing it in the cart.

They both eyed some wire sculptures that were on the shelf beneath the display of Christmas stockings.

“Do you like potpourri dishes?” asked Wanda. “Because I think that’s what some of these are for.”

“Hm, potpourri is kind of a waste, in my opinion,” said Natasha. “Just a lot of garbage.”

Wanda bent down to pick up an eight-inch sleigh painted a faded burgundy. “What do you think of this?”

“Hm, it’s cute,” said Natasha. The back of it was very narrow, the sides of it folded together into a skinny triangle.

“We could put candy in it,” said Wanda.

Natasha smirked. “I think I’d like that.” Wanda placed the little sleigh in the cart. Afterward, Natasha picked out a large wreath of wire boughs that had lights built into it. For decoration she got a large red bow with golden jingle bells. 

“I just remembered,” said Wanda, “I wanted to pick out an ornament for Laura.”

“You can go back and do that,” said Natasha. “Did you still want to get some poinsettias?”

“Yes, of course,” said Wanda as she walked back up the aisle to the tree ornaments. She wanted a pretty one, something that sparkled, not too big or too small but not too fragile, either. The last report from the Bartons had been that baby Nate was had started crawling and was plucking ornaments from the lower branches of their tree. Wanda smiled to herself as she thought of that. Laura would definitely have already picked out a Baby’s First Christmas ornament for Nate. Maybe Wanda should get her something that made her think of Laura, something to show her gratitude. As if in answer to her wish, she looked and saw an angel made from blue and purple-streaked glass, sporting a wire halo and blowing a trumpet. 

Laura Barton had definitely been an angel in her life. It was perfect.

And not only that, Wanda thought, but her brother Pietro was an angel now, watching over her and the Barton family. And the Bartons, of course, thought that Wanda was some   
kind of an angel who had come into their lives, the way they had taken her into their family.

Thinking of Pietro reminded her that she’d wanted a small Nativity set. She wasn’t religious, but Pietro had been, a little. A Nativity piece would be a good reminder. But it couldn’t be too big or ostentatious or else Natasha might object. Walking down the aisle to catch up with Natasha, Wanda looked around and she saw a row of snow globes resting on ornate fiberglass pedestals. Some of them had snowmen, others had reindeer or birds or Santa Clauses or angels. But there were two Nativity snow globes, the figures carved from a single piece and painted shades of beige and brown. Wanda very carefully lifted the snow globe to shake it, and tiny pieces of glitter swirled around the centerpiece. It was simple but beautiful. 

The snowglobes came in boxes behind the display models on the shelf. Wanda got one of the Nativity globes. It was heavier than it looked. Carrying it carefully with the glass angel, she left the aisle to go find Natasha. Natasha was actually no longer in the Christmas section. The next set of aisle, however, was dedicated to home goods, linens, and small furnishings. Wanda found Natasha with the cart looking at two sets of Christmas kitchen towels.

“I thought these would be neat for the kitchen,” she said as Wanda approached her. “What do you think?” One set of towels was white with green and gold plaid trimming and patches in the shape of Christmas trees. The other set was red with white reindeer and snowflakes patterned on the edge.

“I like the white ones,” said Wanda.

“Okay,” said Natasha. “What did you find?”

“I got this for Laura,” she said, showing Natasha the angel.

“Ah, that’s lovely,” she said, smiling broadly.

“And I got this for me,” said Wanda. 

“Oh, one of those snow globes? I saw them. How much are they?”

“Twenty dollars.”

“That’s great. We’ll take it.” Wanda put both of her finds in the cart. Natasha went down the aisle to the kitchen appliances section. She found a new vegetable peeler, but they hadn’t gone much farther when something caught Natasha’s eye.

“I don’t believe it,” said Natasha, pushing the cart as she walked up to the item. It was a salad spinner.

“Is that like the kind we saw at J.C. Penny’s?”

“The same brand,” said Natasha, picking up the display model. She gave the knob on the lid a spin and listened to it whirr. “And it’s several dollars cheaper. Let’s get it here.”   
Natasha got one of the boxed salad spinners and put it in the cart.

They checked out of Target not long after that. Wanda was excited to go home and finish decorating, but then Natasha suggested that they go to J.C. Penny’s. 

“What do you want to get there?” asked Wanda.

“Oh, dunno, just clothes,” said Natasha. “I guess it’s my spy mentality: I like to buy new clothes frequently. Besides, you never know when you’ll want something nice to wear.”

Wanda guessed that she was right. They drove down the busy street of Whitehall to J.C. Penny’s. They spent their time there looking at dresses, blouses, skirts, slacks, and nice formal and semi-formal clothes. They were good at pointing out outfits that they thought the other would like to wear. Natasha, for instance, saw a red lace dress with cap sleeves that reminded her of Wanda. Wanda took a liking to it immediately and ended up buying it. 

Wanda also started to laugh darkly when she saw a leopard-print minidress.

“What, do you think you want that?” Natasha asked as she watched Wanda hold up the dress to examine it.

“No, I think you want that,” said Wanda, grinning.

“Yes I do,” said Natasha as Wanda handed her the outfit. She held it over her body.

“You have to try it on.”

“I think I’m going to,” said Natasha. “Let me see if they’ve got a different size here, first,” she started going through the rack.

“You know, Natasha, if we keep seeing dresses we think we’d like, we should be buying clothes for each other for Christmas.”

“I know we should,” said Natasha as she pulled up a leopard print dress her size. “But if we’re buying them right now, and we’re showing them to each other, then it’s not exactly going to be a surprise for Christmas.”

“True,” said Wanda. “But I think it should not matter, as long as we have each others’ sizes.”

“Right. But just remember, we have to ship all of this stuff to Barton’s.” 

“Who said we had to save all of it for Christmas?”

“Well, just whatever we find that we don’t show each other.” Natasha winked at Wanda.

So from there on, Wanda and Natasha were a lot more careful to not share their finds. They traveled separate for a few minutes, looking for clothes that they thought the other would like. Natasha did go to the fitting room to try on the leopard dress that Wanda had found, and after that she went to the jewelry section, where Wanda caught up with her.

“And what are you looking for now?” Wanda asked her. Natasha was looking at watches.

“I’m not getting anything for you,” said Natasha. “I want to get a watch for Pepper Potts. I always make it a point to get a gift for her.”

“Oh. She’s Tony Stark’s girlfriend, right?”

“Well...she was. Their relationship isn’t quite that straightforward anymore.” Natasha looked distressed for a moment. But then she brushed it off. “But what do you think? This gold watch?”

“Yes, I do like it. It would be nice for her.”

“I’ll get that for her, then,” said Natasha, putting the watch box in her cart, “along with some Gordon’s chocolates. J.C. Penny usually carries some.”  
They were careful to check out at different stands and left the store having spent several hundred dollars apiece. Wanda was a little disgusted with herself. But she tried to take it in stride the way Natasha did as they walked back out to the parking lot.

“When we get back, we’re going to put together our Christmas package for the Bartons,” Natasha declared. “With our ornaments and the clothes we bought over Thanksgiving.”

“And the salad spinner,” Wanda reminded her.

“Of course. It’ll give them something to enjoy before we get there.”

“The robe we ordered online for Clint. Should it have gotten there by now?”

“No, I don’t think it’s even shipped yet.” Natasha opened the car trunk with her key remote and they put their purchases inside.

When they got home, they each had a cup of hot tea and relaxed for a moment, and then they set to work putting up their new Christmas decorations. Wanda turned on some Christmas music--she’d bought the Piano Guys’ Christmas album since Thanksgiving. The new table centerpieces in the kitchen and living room added a festive touch, and Wanda filled the red sleigh they’d found at Target with mint-flavored candies. The new tree ornaments filled in the gaps between the garlands nicely. Natasha commented that they had a “bird theme” going and she liked it. Wanda put the owl ornament front and center on the tree. With the glittering star on top, the little red and silver Christmas tree was perfect.

Wanda decided to put the Nativity snow globe on the side table next to the couch in the living room. Natasha hadn’t realized before then that it was a religious ornament. But she didn’t give it a second thought. 

They loaded the Christmas package for the Bartons before dinner, adding a bag of candy for the kids to enjoy. After dinner, Natasha went to her room to work on her computer while Wanda went to the living room. She was reading the rest of the Harry Potter series from copies she’d picked up at the library. She had finished Goblet of Fire the previous week and was now on Order of the Phoenix. The living room in their little apartment decked with Christmas lights and decorations was the perfect place to read, and she had some hot chocolate to drink while she read about Harry’s struggle against Professor Umbridge.

 

Wanda had hoped to finish reading the Harry Potter series before she left for Christmas, but that seemed like a tall order at this point, especially with a Christmas party and the Star Wars premiere coming up before the break. 

And then later that same week, the Avengers got a call from Agent Parsons in Arizona. Parsons was giving them an update on the Hydra situation there. In short, since the raid in Payson before Thanksgiving there had been no new developments. The prisoners from the latest raid as well as the one back in March were all interrogated and now in locked high-security prisons in the California desert. 

“So was there any connection at all between the two events?” Steve asked him.

“It doesn’t seem like it, Captain,” said Parsons, who was Skyping them from his office in Tempe. “The two groups definitely knew each other. Some of the reinforcements from   
that Lambda base in Vegas said they had worked with the Payson group in the past.”

“But they weren’t working together?” Sam Wilson double-checked.

“No. The Payson club--that’s our nickname for them--they were very well aware of what had happened to their comrades back in March. But they were hoping this time S.H.I.E.L.D. wouldn’t be on top of them. They were wrong.”

“Indeed.”

“Well, thanks to the Payson police department we managed to stop whatever they were doing,” said Rhodey. Steve and the other Avengers nodded in agreement.

“Have you found out anything about where the Payson club was reporting to?” Steve asked.  
“Well, we sent one of our agents undercover to Tijuana to track the lead that one lieutenant gave us,” said Parsons. “They came back okay, but there wasn’t any sign of Hydra there.”

“Perhaps we need a closer look,” said Steve. “Talk to Director Coulson and see if he can get a satellite survey done.”

“I will look into that,” said Parsons. 

“But Hydra definitely was there,” said Wanda. “They may have gone someplace else.”

“Yes, perhaps back to that monster base they’re building,” Parsons answered grimly.

“It would’ve been a good place to hide,” said Natasha.

“Have they mentioned anything else,” Steve pressed, “about who else or where else they came from or reported to?”

“Well, when we did the second round of interrogations, one or two of them mentioned the Kansas City base, but of course S.H.I.E.L.D. took care of that a long time ago. Director Coulson is of the opinion, and I am in agreement, that Hydra is starting to use permanent bases less and less. They are setting up temporary bases in different locations and then moving around.”

“That doesn’t surprise me at this point,” said Steve.

“Of course, they would know better than to stay in one place by now,” said Vision. “Have you been able to learn anything about their commanders?”

“No, I’m afraid not,” said Parsons. “They’re a tight-lipped bunch. We offered more prison privileges to whoever wants to come forward with information. I guess Hydra brainwashes its cronies to enjoy prison or something. Heh, heh.”

“That’s not a laughing matter,” said Steve darkly.

“Of course not, Captain, my apologies. You will be pleased to know that the abandoned mine in Coburn Creek is now being protected by the State Police and the FBI,” Parsons reported. “The Governor and a lot of high-ranking state officials are not pleased with the idea of Hydra trying to reopen that mine.”

“Good to hear,” said Steve. “Has there been any other Hydra activity in your area, aside from Payson?”

Parsons sighed. “We’re keeping an eye out in every location we can think of--Phoenix, West Valley, Prescott, Peoria, Flagstaff, Page. Nothing is happening. It’s pretty quiet.”

“Hm, it might only be temporary,” said Sam. “Stay vigilant.”

“Yes, Wilson. Is there anything else I can do for you, Captain?”

“Just keep an eye out for Hydra,” said Steve. “If you capture anyone, question them thoroughly. I want to know who Hydra’s High Command is.”

“Good. I will make a note of that.”

“Oh, before I forget,” said Wanda, “did the people you have already questioned from Payson mention if they knew anything about the Spectre? Jamie Sneld?”

“Sneld? No, we haven’t learned anything about her from them. And if you’re wondering, Cap, this group also doesn’t know anything about the Winter Soldier.”

“I see,” said Steve. “Well, you’re doing good work down there.”

“Thank you, Captain,” said Parsons. 

“Is there anything we can do for you?”

“Well, this might be a lot to ask, but I would like it if you or someone from your team came to discuss the Hydra situation with us, maybe give my staff a workshop on fighting them and on what their tactics are. Just compare notes.”

“That sounds like a great idea. When would you like to do that?”

“Well, I understand if you can’t come until after the holidays,” said Parsons, “but I feel like the sooner the better. And maybe you guys would like a break from the cold weather up there.”

“Actually I heard that Arizona’s in the freezer this year,” said Sam, smirking.

Parsons laughed. “El Nino, yeah. But hey, come on down, we’ll pay for your hotel rooms and everything. You don’t all have to come.”

“Of course not,” said Steve. “I think we will accept your invitation, and we’ll try to come sometime soon. I will consult with the rest of the team to see who’s interested in coming.”

“Thank you very much, Captain.”

“My pleasure.”

Parsons ended the Skype call.

“Cap, are you sure about this?” Natasha asked him. “I mean, we’ve got a lot going on this month. There’s the staff Christmas party on the sixteenth and Star Wars on the seventeenth. And we break for Christmas on the twenty-first.”

“Hm, any reason we can’t do it sooner?” asked Rhodey.

“Lots of reasons,” said Steve. “We’re planning on heading out tomorrow through the tenth. And then after that we need to be setting up for heading back into the field in January. We’re still waiting for more info on that one place in Arkansas, aren’t we?”

“Yes we are,” said Sam Wilson. “And right after we do our Star Wars thing I’m going to my brother’s place in D.C. for the holidays. So if we do Arizona after that I can’t come.”

“It’s okay, I wasn’t going to ask you to,” said Steve. “You’ve already gone to Arizona once for me.”

Sam laughed. “Good times.”

“I won’t be able to make Arizona either,” said Rhodey.

“I want to come,” said Wanda. 

“Okay, then, anyone else?” Steve looked around the table at the other Avengers. “I’m not pressuring anybody.”

Natasha sighed. “Can I say no?” she asked, raising her hand feebly.

“Had enough Arizona for one lifetime?”

Natasha sniffed. “I don’t feel a particular need to go back there. I reserve the right to say no to things occasionally.”

“All right then. After the Star Wars party you can stay here and keep an eye on the base.”

“May I stay with her?” asked Vision.

“Of course you may,” said Steve.

“Thanks Vision,” said Natasha.

“You are welcome. I just cannot abide the thought of one of my friends being here alone.”

“I won’t be alone. Maria’s not leaving until the twenty-first.”

“Where’s she going?”

“New York City. She’s got family in Queens. And of course, she hangs out with Stark.”

“Has anyone stopped to consider that this will be Mr. Stark’s first Christmas without Dr. Banner?” asked Vision.

Wanda gasped. “You’re right, Vision, that is so.”

“It’ll also be his first Christmas without JARVIS,” said Rhodey, casting a sidelong glance at Vision.

“I vote the New Avengers sends Tony Stark a care package,” said Sam.

“Agreed,” said Natasha. Everyone at the table raised their hands: Steve was the last one to do so, and he didn’t do it until after Sam was glaring at him.

“All right. It’s a good idea. Rhodey, you be in charge of that. Everyone get something small for Tony,” said Steve. “Something considerate. Like candy. What kind of candy does he like?” he asked.

“Real European chocolate,” said Natasha. “Just get him a package of Lindt truffles and he’ll be fine.”

“Okay then,” said Steve. “I’ll get him that. And while we’re on the subject, I also wanted to do a Secret Santa. Just the six of us. The limit is thirty dollars.”

“Make it fifty, Rogers,” said Natasha. “Some of us aren’t cheap.”

“All right then, fifty,” said Steve. “We’ll have the gift exchange right after the party next week. We will draw names tomorrow. Buying gifts for everybody else on the team is too much bother: I think it’s a better use of time if we draw for one person each. Nat, will you be in charge of that?”

“Yes, sir,” said Natasha. “Now, serious question, does it have to be a serious gift or can it be something clever?”

“It can be a gag gift, as long as it’s not something crude.”

“You could regift that fake telephone that Stark got you for Christmas last year,” said Rhodey. He and Sam burst out laughing.

“Very funny,” said Steve.

“So when do we go to Arizona?” asked Wanda.

“Do you have your flight plans to Barton’s yet?” asked Steve.

“Well, I was going to fly there with Natasha on the twenty-first,” said Wanda. She laughed. “I guess I’m not anymore.”

“Eh, no hard feelings,” said Natasha. “But if you’re going anywhere else before then you’d better hurry. Those last-minute plane tickets aren’t cheap.”

“I know.”

“So after Star Wars, then? The eighteenth?” asked Steve.

“Works for me.”

 

Steve later sent an email to Parsons saying he and Wanda would come to Tempe on the eighteenth. They could do their workshop either that night or on the nineteenth. Parsons replied that they would do the workshop at the Tempe office during the day on the nineteenth.

The next day, the Avengers drew names for their Secret Santa, and the day after that they went on a two-day excursion to North Dakota to destroy an abandoned coal mine that Hydra was working in. A day after they got back, Steve got a phone call from Director Coulson while they were at work. As it turned out, Hillary Tanner was planning on going home to Arizona on the eighteenth, and Coulson was planning to go to Portland on the twenty-first. So they would both be coming to the workshop in Tempe on the nineteenth.  
And of course Hillary and Coulson were already planning on coming out to Corinth for the Star Wars premiere and hoped to drag Mitch Sorensen along with them (not that Mitch was complaining). Wanda was immensely looking forward to spending that entire weekend with Hillary and Coulson as well as Steve.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents at the headquarters in Washington, D.C. were also getting into the holiday spirit, with substantial encouragement from Director Coulson, who came to work on the sixteenth sporting a light-up necktie, an elf hat, and a flashing LED wreath. Riding on his shoulder into work, Hedwig didn’t look embarrassed so much as unsure about her master’s enthusiasm. The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were more conservative in their appearance, wearing holiday-themed ties and colored clothes. Hillary wore a red wool cardigan and a red plaid skirt. 

Coulson stepped out of his office to get some coffee and stopped by Hillary and Mitch’s cubicles. 

“Hillary, did you check the weather report for Corinth tomorrow?”

“Yes, I did,” she said opening up a window on her Internet. “High of thirty-five degrees, clear weather all the way. We should get there safely.”

“That’s good to hear,” said Coulson. “Mitch, is Agent Brinton still good to fly us out there?”

“I haven’t heard otherwise,” said Mitch. 

“Why don’t you send him an email to double-check?”

“Yes, sir.”

Coulson went to the suite’s break room. One or two of the agents peeking up over their cubicles laughed quietly at his holiday ensemble.

 

That night, the Avengers threw their Christmas party for the staff of their base. Wanda was wearing the red dress she’d gotten at Penny’s last week and Natasha was wearing a black and white pencil skirt and blouse with a black cardigan on top. Before the festivities officially began, the Avengers met in one of the conference rooms to attend to two small matters of business. The first, of course, was to wrap up their small care package for Tony Stark. Rhodey had volunteered to take it with him when he went to Stark Tower for Christmas. And then they did their Secret Santa exchange. 

Wanda had drawn Vision’s name. She had been unsure of what to get him, but then last week when they had been coming back from their last mission she had heard him saying he would like to have a Santa hat and some jingle bells to wear for the holidays. So she got him a necklace of jingle bells and a hat with a large bell attached to the end. He was very delighted and put them on right away.

“I live for the simpler things in life,” said Vision happily as he rattled his new set of bells (Natasha winced). “And I have always enjoyed the sound of bells.”

Sam got Natasha a set of tiny gold earrings with little red and green stones set in them. Rhodey got Wanda a green and black lace dress (it had been on sale at J.C. Penny’s so he’d managed to keep it under fifty dollars). Steve presented Rhodey with a box of gourmet coffee mix.

“This is great, man,” said Rhodey happily. “You can never go wrong with coffee.”

“On that we can agree,” said Steve, smirking.

“So Natasha,” said Sam. “I take it you were my Secret Santa. What did you get me?”

Natasha smiled sheepishly. Then she bent under the table and pulled out something enormous and metal. It was an entire car door. Steve and Sam both cussed in disbelief.

“I was going to wrap it,” said Natasha, “but I figured I didn’t have enough paper.” She had looped an entire red ribbon around it and tied a bow over the top. Carefully she placed the car door on the table.

“Where did you get that?”

“At the junkyard. Mr. Stingle let me have it for ten dollars. The bow was twice as expensive.”

Sam looked down at the car door. “I don’t get it.”

“It’s a reminder of the time that Steve saved our lives by breaking your car door and surfing across the freeway.”

Steve looked at Natasha. “Did you get me the rest of the car?”

“No, this is Sam’s present.”

“Well, not that I don’t appreciate the gesture,” said Sam, “but couldn’t you have called up the Winter Soldier to ask if I could have my steering wheel back?”

Natasha folded her arms. “Would he have kept it?”

Steve broke into a laugh. “I’m sure if Bucky ever moves in he’ll think it’s hilarious. Maybe he’ll even sign it.” He gave Sam an elbow in the ribs.

Rhodey shook his head. “You guys are so weird.”

Vision cleared his throat. “Captain, I should like to give you my present now.”

“All right,” said Steve, turning to face him. “What did you get me?”

Vision held out a small package wrapped in newspaper. “A small token.”

Steve took the package and opened it. It was a magnetic photo frame, and inside it was a black and white group photo of the new Avengers.

“I thought that since you are the leader of the team,” said Vision, “that it would be appropriate to show you my gratitude, as well as my love for all of you. You have all been a wonderful family to me.”

Everyone “awwed” appropriately. Steve hugged Vision, and the next thing anyone knew they were in a group hug. 

“All right, the party downstairs should be starting in a few minutes. Avengers dismissed,” Steve announced. 

The Christmas party was being held in the hangar. The balcony and walls had been festooned with garlands. Dr. Eric Selvig and his assistants had provided the tree, complete with decorations. There was punch and gingerbread spice cake and cheese and little smokies. Everyone mingled through the room and took pictures with their friends. It was a happy time for all.

 

The next afternoon, Steve, Wanda, and Natasha went to the regional airport to pick up Coulson, Mitch, and Hillary. Coulson was already wearing a Jedi robe over his shirt and tie.

“That’s the one you wore to the Halloween party last year at the tower, right?” Steve asked.

“Yes, it is,” said Coulson. He sighed. “Seems like forever ago.”

“You didn’t bring Emily’s lightsaber, did you?”

“Oh, no, no, heavens no!” said Coulson, shaking his head. “I’d have to take that with my on civilian transport later--there’s no way they’d let me keep it. No. I brought this   
instead.” He pulled out a toy lightsaber with a blue blade.

Steve laughed feebly. “Well, let’s get in the car, Obi-wan Coulson.”

Coulson snorted. “Very funny, Cap.”

Coulson and Cap sat up front in Steve’s car while Wanda, Hillary, and Mitch sat in the back. Hillary would be spending the night at Nat and Wanda’s apartment while Coulson and Mitch went to the hotel.

“Are you excited?” Wanda asked them.

“Oh, I am soooo excited!” said Mitch, rubbing his hands together. “I mean, I’m not as stoked as Coulson--I’m gonna put my costume on later--”

“What’s your costume?” asked Wanda.

“Darth Freaking Maul!”

“In case you haven’t noticed,” said Hillary, “Mitch is a huge Star Wars nerd.”

Mitch leaned forward in his seat. “Hey, Coulson, did Emily ever fight Darth Maul?”

“No,” said Coulson. “She did fight General Grievous once, though.”

“Ah, siiiiiick. Did she ever tell you about that?”

“Ask me later, Sorensen.”

Hillary rolled her eyes and muttered, “Prequels fanboy.”

Who is this Emily person they keep talking about? Wanda wondered. Maybe now wasn’t the time to ask.

“Hey, Coulson, did you bring Hedwig, by any chance?” asked Steve.

“She should be here tonight,” said Coulson. “I sent her up yesterday evening.”

“Okay.”

“Are you going to call in that favor?”

“Tomorrow morning,” said Steve. “That should give her a week. Hopefully plenty of time.”

“But you’re willing to accept that it might take longer?”

“I am,” said Steve.

Wanda made small talk with Hillary. Hillary was flattered that Wanda remembered her family.

“Did you want to stay with us this weekend, by the way?”

“Of course!” said Wanda. “Why not?”

“Well, you’ll have to sleep on the couch again.”

Wanda laughed. “I do not mind.”

“Hey, it’s only fair, I’m sleeping on your couch tonight.”

Coulson dropped of Hillary and Wanda and Wanda’s apartment. Hillary immediately unpacked a cheap white dress with a studded plastic belt, and then went to the vanity to do   
her hair.

While she was trying to recreate Princess Leia’s famous buns, Natasha returned from an unknown errand and stopped to say hello to Hillary.

“Are you sure you’re not scared of spending the night with Black Widow?” Natasha asked.

“Of course I’m not,” said Hillary as she fiddled with some bobby pins. “You spent four nights at my house.”

“I wasn’t about to attack you under your own roof,” said Natasha, “but just be careful. This is my turf.” She gave Hillary a pat on the back.

Hillary groaned as the bun she was trying to fix fell out of place for the tenth time.

“Ugh! This hairstyle is impossible!”

“Have you ever done your hair like that before?” asked Wanda. She was sitting on her bed with the door open.

“No. I thought about practicing doing my hair, though. But I didn’t get any time.”

Wanda got off of her bed. “Could I help?” she asked.

Hillary shrugged. “Sure.” It took a lot of bobby pins, and by the time she was done her hands were sticky with hairspray, but Hillary managed to hold still so Wanda could do her   
hair.

“Thanks, that looks perfect!” said Hillary, sitting up straight.

“Don’t touch it,” said Wanda. 

“How does it feel?” asked Natasha from her room.

“Like I wanna take over the galaxy,” said Hillary, modeling in front of the mirror. Wanda laughed.

“DO IT!” said Natasha.

“You’ll probably beat me at it.”

The showing was at ten-thirty p.m. At eight, Natasha and Wanda put on the matching Star Wars t-shirts that Natasha had gotten for them and the three of them went out to dinner at a local restaurant.

“It’s like you’re my maids of honor or my bodyguards,” said Hillary as she led the two of them out of the apartment.

“Or you’re like Queen Amidala in The Phantom Menace and we’re your decoys,” said Wanda.

“Hm, it could work,” said Natasha.

Hillary sent a selfie of her buns to her boyfriend Mark. He texted her back saying that she should wear her hair like that when they went to see Star Wars.

After dinner, they went to the Corinth Cinema 9 to meet up with the Avengers’ Staff and their friends. Mitch was wearing red and black face paint and had styled his hair into thick   
spikes to imitate Darth Maul’s horns. Steve was also wearing a Jedi robe--he claimed he’d also worn it for halloween with Emily Bridger once. Vision was sporting a pair of Yoda   
ears, Sam was also wearing a Jedi costume, and Rhodey was wearing a t-shirt. Quite a few of the Avengers’ staff who had come for the showing were dressed in costume. None   
was more ostentatious than Maria Hill, who had rented Princess Leia’s Bespin gown from The Empire Strikes Back. 

The group was allowed into the theater for their showing at ten minutes past ten. 

“Oh my gosh, can you believe it?” asked Mitch when they took their seats. “In just twenty more minutes we get to see Star Wars Episode VII!”

“Yes, I can believe it,” said Coulson dryly. 

“Well, nineteen now, actually,” said Wanda, checking her watch.

Mitch gave a cry of excitement.

“Mitch! Calm down!” Hillary said. “Ugh, somebody please keep the candy away from this two-year-old.” 

But one of Selvig’s assistants sitting near the front also gave a whoop. Clearly Mitch wasn’t alone in being unable to restrain his excitement.

“You showed Bucky the other six films?” Steve asked Hillary.

“Yeah,” said Hillary.

“Well, did he like them?” 

Hillary shrugged. “Maybe. I guess so. Tell me, though, did Return of the Jedi really influence your decision to save him? I mean, the whole Luke saving his father thing?”

Steve shrugged. “I dunno. Star Wars was the last thing on my mind at the time.”

“Hmph, well, there’s no saying it didn’t influence you. I mean, he thought that was where you must’ve gotten the idea.”

“I guess you can let him think that.”

Hillary, Natasha and Coulson weren’t huge Star Wars fans, and Steve and Wanda were both fairly new to the franchise and didn’t have quite the sentimental attachment--well,   
except for one thing.

“So do you think we’re going to find out what happened to Emily?” Steve asked Coulson in a whisper.

“I doubt it,” said Coulson. “She wasn’t actually a character in the story.”

“Yes, but--” Steve lowered his voice even more and Wanda couldn’t hear what he was saying to Coulson.

“I agree,” Coulson answered him. But before he could say more, the lights went dim. Everyone in the theater cheered. The previews were mostly for action films. The only buffer between the trailers and the opening crawl was the brief, silent flash of the LucasFilm logo. And then Wanda could barely hear the opening notes of the theme music over the screaming that erupted in front of and behind her. Then everyone fell silent as the opening crawl appeared on the screen, followed by spaceships descending to the planet Jakku.

The fact that Luke Skywalker was missing was of interest to Coulson and Steve, but they decided to wait and see if they would get any explanation later in the film. In the meantime, everyone was very entertained by the debonair pilot Poe Dameron, the stormtrooper Finn, the adorable droid BB-8, and a girl named Rey who, apart from being a lonely scavenger, didn’t seem to be anyone important. The crowd roared with approval when the Millennium Falcon appeared onscreen, and one exciting chase scene later completely lost it at the appearance of Han Solo and Chewbacca. As Kylo Ren got more screentime, the audience was increasingly more condescending towards him--until Supreme Leader Snoke revealed something important. Wanda could feel the words “Wait, what?” and “Oh no” crossing the minds of at least fifty other people in the room.

Apparently Han Solo knew something about what had happened to Luke. Coulson and Steve both sat up straighter when he told his story. “Luke was training a new generation of Jedi, but one of his pupils turned to the Dark Side, destroyed everything...Those who knew him best say he went looking for the first Jedi temple.”

But he wouldn’t say more than that. A few of the people sitting close to Wanda, particularly Mitch, kept expecting Solo to say something to Rey that would reveal who she was. But it never came. The vision Rey had when she touched the old lightsaber was even more confusing.

And then Princess Leia arrived--General Leia, as she was now known in the story. Hillary did a silent double fist-pump while everyone else in the theater cheered. Wanda’s interest in Han and Leia grew as she listened to their conversation about their lost son. And Steve was feeling sympathetic as well. 

“If you see our son, bring him home.”

Wanda wondered what would come of that statement. She didn’t have to wait long, however.

Han Solo confronted his wayward son and paid the ultimate price. The entire scene, the whole movie theater was silent, everyone watching intently. People didn’t even think, they were so caught up in what was happening, hoping against hope until the last second. And then there were a few gasps of sorrow and shock. Wanda thought she could hear Mitch making moaning noises. A few people up front were crying. Han Solo had been one of the most popular characters in the original trilogy. His death was heartbreaking to everyone in the room.

The rest of the film was clouded by the sad event. The mood did lighten a little, however, when Rey picked up the troublesome lightsaber and promptly kicked Kylo Ren’s butt with it. Wanda smiled a little to herself. She knew exactly how it felt, to be more powerful than she realized and able to do extraordinary things. 

A few people were confused by the closing shot with Rey holding out the lightsaber to Luke, but when the credits rolled everyone cheered. 

“That was great, wasn’t it?” said Coulson, looking around him.

“That was a ton of fun,” said Steve. “I liked it.”

“At least it was a lot better than the prequels.”

Mitch sniffed. “But why was Kylo Ren such a whiney jerk?”

“Wasn’t Anakin one?” asked Hillary.

“At least Rey wasn’t a whiner,” said Natasha. “Honestly, I’ll be very surprised if she turns out to be a Skywalker. I’m glad she taught Kylo Ren some manners.”

“Perhaps she did,” said Wanda. “People rarely walk away the same from those kinds of encounters with their enemies. And if Snoke is wanting to train him some more...Episode   
VIII could be interesting.” 

Steve walked up next to Hillary. “So do you think Bucky would have liked it?”

Hillary shook her head. “I dunno.” She was flattered that Steve would ask for her opinion on his friend. It was a far cry from a few months ago when they were barely on speaking terms because of the same issue.

They reached the front lobby of the movie theater. Another showing was letting out and people were talking excitedly in the foyer. Wanda and Hillary went to use the bathroom. When they came out, Hillary went to go join Natasha and Mitch, who were waiting near the front door. Wanda, however, had noticed Steve and Coulson in one corner, talking.   
They looked very much like the Jedi warriors of the Prequels, their hands folded together under their robes as they spoke quietly. Wanda couldn’t hear them over the crowd.   
Coulson turned to take his leave and Steve clasped him on the shoulder. 

Wanda went to join her friends. 

“Gosh, I can’t wait to get home and take this makeup off,” said Mitch. 

“So how long did it take you to do that?” asked Natasha.

“About twenty minutes. I put a layer of black paint on before I use the red paint. And then it takes another ten minutes to do my hair like this.”

“He dressed up like this for Halloween,” said Hillary. “He’s quite the makeup artist.”

Wanda, Natasha, and Hillary said their goodbyes to their friends and went to get in their car. Coulson told Wanda and Hillary to be ready to leave by ten o’clock the following   
morning. They passed the short drive back to the apartment talking about S.H.I.E.L.D. stuff with Hillary.

 

When he reached his hotel that night, Coulson found Hedwig waiting in one of the trees outside. He brought her inside to spend the night. 

The next morning at dawn, Steve picked up Coulson and Hedwig and drove them to a hillside on the edge of town.

“I figured this would be a good spot,” said Steve as their shoes cracked the glittering crust of snow. “I like to come out here to think sometimes.”

“Is that so?” said Coulson. “I ran into Sharon Carter a few weeks ago, by the way.”

“Oh. How is she?” Tendrils of mist rose around his face as he spoke.

“She’s doing fine. She’s got her hands full, trying to keep the CIA involved in the fight against Hydra.” Hedwig sat on Coulson’s shoulder, bobbing her head around at their surroundings.

“Nah, she doesn’t have to do that.”

“She thinks she needs to,” said Coulson. “So I guess we can take whatever help we can get. Did you ever call her, by the way?”

Steve smirked. “Who said anything about calling her?”

“Natasha thinks you’d be a cute couple.”

“Of course. I doubt we’d be a cute anything, personally.” They walked up the side of the hill to a spot that faced the south and west. Steve stopped when they came to a spot under a skinny sapling that hung over a flat spot that overlooked the valley.

“Well,” said Coulson.

“This should do,” said Steve. Steve looked at Hedwig. Hedwig glanced down at him briefly and then at Coulson.

“Are you ready, Hedwig?” Coulson asked her. Hedwig did not make any noise in reply, but he let down Hedwig from his shoulder onto his hand. “Well, I most likely won’t see you again for a few days, so Merry Christmas.” Hedwig chirped at him and he scratched the feathers on the back of her head. “All right.” He held up Hedwig so she could have a good look at Steve.

“My friend’s name is James Buchanan Barnes,” said Steve, uttering the name as if it were a prayer. “He goes by Bucky for short. He was last seen in Albuquerque, New Mexico, but he is probably a long ways from there by now. I don’t have anything for you to give him--I don’t think there’s anything from me that he would accept. But I just need you to find him and make sure that he’s okay. We haven’t heard anything from him in a month and a half.” Hedwig looked at Steve, her golden eyes unblinking. “If you find him and he’s okay, come right back to me. I’ll be in Brooklyn. If you find him and he’s in trouble, stay close to him and make sure he gets help, because I might not be close enough to get to him. Will you do that for me, Hedwig?”

Hedwig looked up at Steve. She sat up straight and then started to flap her wings a little.

“She can do it,” said Coulson.

“All right. Good luck.” 

Coulson stretched out his arm away from him and Steve. Hedwig flapped her wings and then rose into the air, taking a few pumps and then gliding majestically off into the pale blue morning. 

“There she goes,” said Coulson. 

Steve watched in silence until she was too far away too be seen clearly.

 

Mitch woke up with the other bed in his hotel room still empty. He considered taking another shower--his hair still smelled of gel from the previous night. 

He had to stop and sit up in bed a moment while his mind reeled when he suddenly remembered what the occasion had been. 

He smiled to himself. Star Wars Episode VII had been amazing. 

Mitch got dressed and went to the hotel’s breakfast room by himself. It was while he was trying to stick a fork through his greasy scrambled eggs that Coulson entered the room. He was wearing a coat and a winter hat, the kind with the ridiculous lobes over the ears, though he removed it quickly after entering the room.

Coulson got himself a plate of pancakes and a cup of orange juice and went to join Mitch.

“Did you sleep good?”

“Yes I did, boss,” Mitch answered with his mouth full. You?”

“I slept all right,” said Coulson, nodding.

“Were you out with Cap just now?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d it go?”

“It went all right. The weather’s fair. We should have a good drive to Rochester.”

“That’s good to hear,” said Mitch. “My mom said if my plane got in on time tonight we’d go see Star Wars with the family.”

“A second time? Already?”

Mitch sniffed. “Don’t look at me, I’ve got friends who are going again two more times today. I have no idea where they have that kind of money.”

“Is it that good a movie or was it already planned?” 

Mitch shrugged. “I guess they must’ve gotten tickets in advance. So how about Luke Skywalker? Why’s he up all alone on a rock?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” said Coulson.

“Your guess is better. You knew an actual Jedi, didn’t you?”

“Shh!” Coulson said, waving his hand to get Mitch to quiet down. 

“Oh, sorry, I guess you’re still in a lot of pain about that, aren’t you?” Mitch looked sideways at Coulson. “Well...do you think she would’ve liked Episode VII? Emily?”

Coulson stared at his plate. “I guess so.” He looked like he didn’t want to speak.

“Do you feel better about it, now? Now that we’re getting more Star Wars movies? Now that Episode VII is out?”

 

“I’m not sure Episode VII makes me feel better about anything.”

And Mitch had absolutely no idea what he meant by that.

Coulson quickly made up for the awkward pause that followed by asking Mitch about his family and his plans for the holiday break. They finished breakfast and returned to their room to pack and get ready for the day. 

Steve Rogers picked them up at a quarter to ten. They went to Natasha and Wanda’s apartment to pick up Wanda and Hillary. When they knocked on the apartment door, however, Hillary was still packing and Wanda was doing her makeup.

“Wanda, you look just fine, come on!” said Steve, who strolled into the vanity area to get her to hurry up. “Please tell me you at least have the rest of your stuff packed?”

“Yes, it’s on the bed,” said Wanda.

Steve went into Wanda’s room and came out carrying her suitcase and duffle bag. He took them to his waiting car to load it.

Coulson and Mitch were in the living room, sitting on the couch. Natasha was in there chatting with them.

“Why are they running late?”

“Because Hillary and Wanda wanted me to make them breakfast,” said Natasha, checking her phone. “And then we sat around and talked for a few minutes when we were done eating.”

Mitch eyed the dirty dishes in the sink.

“And is that your fault?” asked Coulson.

“Maybe,” said Natasha, who was answering a text.

A few hurried minutes later, Steve said that Coulson and Mitch could get back in the car. They watched as Steve came out carrying Hillary’s suitcase. Wanda was hurriedly stuffing something into her purse. Hillary and Natasha were hugging and Hillary was practically dragging Nat out the door. And then on the porch Natasha had to hug Wanda and Steve goodbye very tenderly. And Steve was caught playing with Natasha’s hair a little and he paused to compliment it. But finally the three of them turned away from the door. Hillary and Wanda waved goodbye to Natasha one more time. They seemed to be taking their sweet time coming down the stairs. 

Coulson rolled down his car window. “Hey, I thought we were on a schedule!”

None of the three answered them. Steve and Hillary went to the back to put Hillary’s suitcase in the trunk while Wanda got into the backseat with Mitch. Finally Hillary and Steve got in the car and they drove away.

“What took you so long?” asked Coulson irritably.

“Saying goodbye, of course,” said Steve. 

Natasha was watching them from the balcony as they drove away.

Once they were out of town, Steve set the cruise control of his car up on full speed--in fact at moments he was even exceeding the speed limit.

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to be going this fast?” Coulson asked at one point.

“Nah. They’re not gonna pull over Captain America.”

They made it to the Rochester airport without incident. Steve parked his car and they carried their baggage into the terminal. The bag check and security check went without incident. All of the travel and security agents were even pleased to see Captain America. 

Once they were past security, they went into the hallway where the gates divided off.

“Well, my fight’s over this way,” said Mitch. “It was fun hanging out with you all, driving to the airport, going to see Star Wars. Midnight premieres are much better with friends, I’ve found.”

“Really, Mitch, have you been to one alone?”

“It wasn’t my fault. All of my friends ditched me. I ended up sitting between...well, that’s another story. I’ve gotta go catch my flight. See ya.” He hugged Hillary.

“Merry Christmas,” said Coulson, reaching out to shake hands, but Mitch hugged him as well. 

Then he looked over at the two Avengers. “Well, I don’t normally hug superheroes--”

“Oh, Mitch, don’t be silly,” said Wanda. She gave him a hug and a peck on the cheek. Mitch blushed and suppressed a giggle. Then Steve picked him up in a big bear hug before he was ready. 

“Well, ha, I suppose I’ve always wanted a hug from Captain America.”

Steve dropped him and patted him on the shoulder. “Take care of yourself, Mitch.”

“Will do,” said Mitch, picking up his carry-on bag. He started to walk away but turned to wave goodbye one last time. “And Merry Christmas.”

“Bye!” said Hillary.

“Merry Christmas,” said Steve quietly.

There came an announcement on the intercom that Mitch’s flight to Cleveland, from whence he would connect to Los Angeles, was preparing to board. Mitch ran to get to the gate, but as he did so he had a thought. It was a privilege, getting to work with superheroes on a regular basis, but it was still nice that Star Wars hadn’t lost its magic.

 

Coulson and company’s plane took them to Nashville. When they boarded the connecting flight to Phoenix, Wanda went down the walkway right behind Steve. The stewardess standing just inside the door to the plane recognized Captain America immediately. Wanda didn’t think anything of it until during the pre-flight announcements the stewardess announced that Captain America was on the flight. There was some scattered applause and cheers from the other passengers, but Wanda felt some negativity coming from the minds of most of them. 

Hillary and Wanda sat on one side of the aisle with a woman they didn’t know. Coulson and Steve sat with an old man with a mustache and round sunglasses. He was asleep the entire time he was on the plane, but Steve and Coulson managed to wake him and help him up to get his bags.

“Thanks, sonny,” he said to Steve, flashing him a cheesy grin and a thumbs up. Steve and Coulson only looked at each other.

It seemed strange to Wanda, to be coming back so quickly to a place she’d just left a few weeks ago. It was early evening when they landed, already after dark. The airport terminals were crowded with holiday travelers. The baggage claim carousels were choked with suitcases. As they waited for their bags to appear, Wanda caught a sigh escaping Steve’s mouth. Of course he had told Wanda about the last time he had been here--when he’d almost found Bucky. She wasn’t really sure how to help him about that, or even if she could.

“Director Coulson,” said a male voice behind them. They turned around to see Agent Parsons, dressed in a long wool coat and a brown scarf. He was taller than Coulson and had crooked eyebrows and a very shiny bald pate fringed with black hair.

“Agent Parsons, nice to see you,” said Coulson, turning to greet the man. “Of course you know Captain Rogers.”

Steve came forward to shake hands with Parsons. “How do you do?”

“I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting you in person,” said Parsons. “How is Avenging going?”

Steve sighed. “It’s going. I’m glad to be taking a breaking for the holidays at any rate.”

“Of course.” Wanda came forward to shake hands with Agent Parsons, the director of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Tempe office. And lastly he looked at Hillary Tanner.

“Agent Tanner, how are you?”

“Doing well, sir,” said Hillary, nodding at her former supervisor and biting her lip. 

Parsons turned to Coulson. “I have your rental car waiting for you, sir.”

“Thank you very much,” said Coulson. Steve went to go grab Wanda’s suitcase. “I also have your reservation at the Fairview Marriott in Mesa, like you requested. Did you still want two suites?”

“Just one will be enough, thank you,” said Coulson. “Miss Maximoff will be staying with Agent Tanner.”

“Oh, really?” said Parsons. “Agent Tanner, haven’t we warned you against keeping superhumans at your house?”

“Wanda has stayed at my house before, Agent Parsons,” Hillary spoke up. “My family likes having her.”

“Well, your family liked having the Winter Soldier, too.”

“We’re not doing anything you should be worried about.” 

“I do not take advantage of her, sir,” said Wanda firmly. “Besides, it is only for three nights. It is nice to stay with a normal family.” She smiled at Hillary.

Parsons was contemplating a retort when Steve returned from the carousel. “Here’s your suitcase, Wanda,” said Steve, handing it to her. “Do we have everything?”

“Yes,” said Coulson.

“Then if you’ll follow me,” said Agent Parsons, heading to the door.

The outside air was dry and cool--so dry that Wanda immediately licked her lips. She made a note to herself to get chapstick later. Parsons led them to a car that was parked on   
the curb. He handed a set of keys to Coulson.

“Now, I wanted to ask you, since you and the Captain were in town, the rest of the staff was wondering if you were doing anything tomorrow night.”

Coulson and Steve looked at each other.

“No, we don’t have anything planned after the workshop.”

“Well, I’m not particularly in favor of this idea,” Parsons said, “but we wanted to have a little Christmas party tomorrow night, and have you all as our special guests.”

“Oh, that would be wonderful,” said Hillary.

“Sure, why not?” said Wanda.

“We will probably have it at one of our houses. Agent Johnson said maybe at her house but she isn’t sure because she has company coming. Agent Swill also was unsure. Kearns and I would rather not, but if we have to--”

“We could have it at my house,” said Hillary. “I don’t think my folks are doing anything tomorrow night.” 

“You sure, Hillary?” asked Steve. 

“Of course. My parents wouldn’t mind at all. Is everyone else bringing the food?”

“That was the plan,” said Parsons. “I’m bringing little smokies, of course.”

“Perfect,” said Coulson.

“That’ll be excellent,” said Steve. 

“Yes, well, talk to your parents, Agent Tanner, and see what they say,” said Parsons. Coulson opened the door of their rental car.

“Yes, sir,” Hillary called to him as she got in the front with Coulson. 

Hillary texted her family right away to say that she had landed and that S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted to have a Christmas Party at their house the following night. Coulson dropped them off   
at Hillary’s house. He and Steve helped Hillary and Wanda carry their baggage inside. Steve went no further into the house than the kitchen. Jo and Trey were both home and they greeted Steve warmly. Trey, of course, remembered Steve from his previous, ill-fated visit. Jo and Trey both readily agreed to hosting the party. With that settled, Steve and Coulson both left, unable to be encouraged to stay longer.

Wanda didn’t mind sleeping on the couch. However, Trey Tanner had found a spare mattress and he set it up in Hillary’s room for Wanda to use. Hillary and Wanda both unpacked and then Jo heated up some leftovers for them to eat. While they were getting ready for bed, Hillary’s brother Cody got home from work. Cody said hello to Wanda briefly and smiled at her, but they didn’t say much otherwise. The girls went to bed around eleven, with Hillary staying up a little later with her lamp on to read something.

 

The S.H.I.E.L.D. workshop was at ten in the morning. Coulson brought doughnuts and hot chocolate for everyone. Agent Parsons was there, and of course so were Agents Swill, Clay, Kearns, and Johnson. Also in attendance was a new face, Rebecca Mikkelson. Rebecca was a transfer from S.H.I.E.L.D.’s headquarters in D.C. but Hillary hadn’t known her very well. She had only been working at S.H.I.E.L.D. a couple of years longer than Hillary herself.

The meeting started with Steve and Wanda giving the Arizona S.H.I.E.L.D. team the lowdown on the Avengers’ most recent activities. Coulson and Hillary also told them about what Headquarters and other branches of S.H.I.E.L.D. were doing. Agent Clay had trouble staying awake and Marcie took copious notes on a legal pad. Agent Parsons didn’t comment until Coulson opened the floor for questions, and then it was only to ask for the latest on the “Ant-Man” and the incident at PymTech that summer. Coulson and Steve were eager to provide what details they had. When that discussion was ended, Agent Swill raised his hand. 

“Just something I’ve been wondering about, but why does it seem like it’s easier for Hydra to take hold here in Arizona?” Swill asked. “I mean, yes, the Winter Soldier chose to come here to hide, but Hydra was ready and waiting for him, it seems like. And they set up a secret base in Scottsdale without our knowing, and then just recently we had the mine incident. It seems like they can do whatever it is they want here.”

“You’re right, that’s been bothering me, too,” said Agent Kearns. Everyone sort of glanced up at Steve.

“I know it seems like there’s been a lot happening here lately,” Steve began, “and I’m not trying to downplay this in anyway, but it looks like Hydra is done here for now. As to why they had such an easy time getting here before, I couldn’t tell you.”

“Well, of course, there is that Base Lambda in Las Vegas that’s been reinforcing them,” said Marcie. “We haven’t been able to shut them down at all. No doubt they keep sending people to us.”

“Yes, but why us? is what I’m asking,” said Swill. “Why here? And why now?”

“It seems to me that while the Avengers have been off taking care of their bigger bases,” Rebecca spoke up, “that it’s easier for smaller parts of Hydra to creep in wherever they’re not watching. They don’t see S.H.I.E.L.D. as a threat. They used to be part of us. They’re just...coming in to take what they want. No offense, Captain.”

“None taken,” said Steve.

“Well, what do they want?” asked Agent Clay. 

“Natural resources,” said Parsons. “Eurekaite. Uranium and other radioactive minerals. Stuff they couldn’t get their hands on before. The Avengers aren’t worried about the   
smaller stuff like that.”

“Well, should we be?” asked Wanda.

“No, you guys are doing a great job,” said Hillary. “The thing is, weapons-grade minerals are mostly found in deposits on state or national property--the Grand Canyon, for one. It’s S.H.I.E.L.D.’s job to coordinate protecting those minerals. The Avengers aren’t even in the picture. You guys are the first line of defense.” She looked at her friends solemnly.

“But they have ways of getting around the state,” said Parsons. “They don’t fool around.”

“That’s right,” said Hillary. “But unless there’s been an emergency, for the most part Arizona S.H.I.E.L.D. has been able to handle the situation on their own. State law enforcement is more than willing to help out.”

“Well, who says one of these days they aren’t going to pull out all the stops?” said Kearns. “I mean, we don’t even know what they’re planning.”

“That’s why you have to be ready,” said Hillary. “And you are ready.”

“How about the Mexico base, Cap?” said Agent Parsons. “They’re pretty close to here. Could that be a problem?”

“It could be,” said Steve, sighing. “We’re having a hard time trying to convince two governments to let us go in there to shut it down. Nobody trusts the Avengers, not after   
Sokovia.”

Wanda winced at the reference.

“They’re dang wrong not to,” said Parsons. “Well, what do we need to do?”

“Do you know what areas specifically Hydra is targeting?” asked Steve.

“Sure.” Parsons turned on the projector and pulled up several maps, one of the Coburn Creek site, one near the south rim of the Grand Canyon, the rest in obscure locations. Two were on the Navajo Indian Reservation, which, Steve admitted, would be a little harder to get to. But Coulson and Steve both gave suggestions to pass on to government law enforcement at various levels on how to defend the different spots from Hydra encroachment. 

“And if you’re having a hard time convincing people, just call up me or Coulson,” said Steve. “But considering we’re talking about giving Hydra less access to materials for potential WMDs, they’ll have to take you seriously.”

“Not without hard evidence,” said Parsons. “Trust me, Rogers, I’ve worked with State law enforcement. They don’t see Hydra as a threat.”

“Are you sure?” Steve asked, smirking.

“I’m just saying, it’s hard to get anything done with them.”

“Parsons, relax,” said Marcie.

Agent Clay looked across the table at Hillary. “So what about the Winter Soldier?”

Coulson sighed. “We haven’t found anything for over two months. Of course he hasn’t been anywhere near here since April. But he’s nowhere to be found in Denver or Albuquerque. He’s gone. That’s just it.”

“Well, he does have a reason to come here, though, if he does turn up again, right?” asked Agent Kearns.

Hillary frowned. “I’m under the impression that Bucky doesn’t want to lead Hydra anywhere near my family again. You remember what happened in March. And after Hydra killing his girlfriend, well,” Hillary looked at Steve, “I think he just wants to stay hidden this time.”

Steve clenched his jaw a little.

“I’m surprised you haven’t been able to find him, Captain,” said Parsons. 

“He does remember me, I’m sure of it,” Steve said, looking at Hillary. “But Hillary’s right: the Bucky I knew wouldn’t have cared, but the man he is now--he thinks the best way to protect any of us is to stay hidden. And I think we’d better let him.”

Hillary raised her eyebrows at Steve. Then she smiled at him. 

“Yeah, well for the record, Cap,” said Agent Parsons, “Hydra doesn’t give a crap about your precious Bucky. He’s only a weapon to them.”

“I know,” said Steve. “But that’s why we need to find him as soon as he lets us, so we can keep Hydra from getting him.”

Wanda could feel Agent Parsons’ resentment. Bucky was only the Winter Soldier to Parsons. He was only someone who caused trouble, even after leaving Hydra. And he’d already given Parsons a headache that year. 

Steve knew that Parsons felt this way--a lot of people did. But he wasn’t going to call out Parsons for it.

Steve broke eye contact with Parsons and looked around the conference room. “Your office has been critical in keeping Hydra at bay while the Avengers are off fighting. I know it hasn’t been easy, but I’ve appreciated it all the same. We know what we’re up against, even if we don’t know what they’re planning. I don’t know what else there is you can do, but you can do this: stay vigilant. Keep fighting. And if they come back, do whatever you think is necessary to stop them. And whatever you do, keep protecting the people in   
this area.” He looked at Hillary. “Do it for them. Do it for the people that you care about.”

“Well spoken, Cap,” said Agent Clay, who clapped a couple of times. Swill clapped also. Everyone else got up to throw away their plastic dishes and stretch before leaving. Hillary double-checked to see that everyone had directions to her house. Coulson and Steve were planning (or rather plotting) to visit Trey’s garage. Steve said it was because they owed him.

Agent Swill’s question had intrigued Wanda. Why did Hydra take such an interest in Arizona?

S.H.I.E.L.D. had destroyed Hydra’s original base in the area long before Bucky had even shown up. It had to be something to do with them. These were good people, Wanda had observed when she had watched the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents during the meeting. Not just good in the general sense but good in the sense that deep down, they wanted to do what was right. Maybe that was something that Hydra feared. And that made sense. Hydra, with all of its evil, feared goodness. It feared the goodness that had sheltered its former Asset here a year ago. And it feared the goodness that motivated this small but loyal team of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents to stand up to them again and again. 

Yes, there was goodness here in Arizona. And Hydra with its encroaching evil wanted to destroy it, to snuff it out. 

Well, they won’t get very far with that, she thought to herself as she got in the car to go back to Hillary’s house.

Not for the first time, Wanda had the sense that these events were all part of a larger struggle between the forces of good and evil--as cheesy as it sounded, it was true. She was reminded of the words that Maz Kanata had spoken to Han Solo, Finn, and Rey in The Force Awakens: there was ultimately only one fight, one fight between good and evil, between darkness and light. 

 

Wanda loved the Tanners’ Christmas decorations. They had a tall tree leaning against one of the walls in the living room, covered with blue and silver tinsel and shining ornaments hanging on every branch, and there was a beautiful angel on the top. There was a Christmas village on the credenza in the hallway that she thought was simply enchanting, and there were decorative candles and a nativity set on the piano. And of course there were pretty red stockings with white trim hanging on the bookcase behind the dining table, labeled with the names of each of the Tanner children. The living room felt just magical. 

At the Tanners’, Wanda helped Hillary and Jo to clean the house and set up every available chair in the living room for the party. The guests started arriving at six. Agent Parsons brought his smokies, as promised. Macie Johnson brought homemade cookies and a salad. Agent Kearns brought a platter of meatballs and another of sliced ham. Swill and Clay brought chips. And Rebecca brought a veggie tray.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t really have time to cook anything, she apologized as she came through the kitchen door.

“No, you’re just fine, dear,” said Jo as she took the tray. “This is just what we needed.”

Right after Rebecca entered, Steve and Coulson arrived. Hillary and Cody were sitting at the table talking to Wanda (well, Hillary was doing most of the talking), but all three of them looked up when they heard Steve’s voice. Hillary nodded to her brother and then led him across the floor to say hello to Steve.

“So what did you two do this afternoon?” Hillary asked Steve and Coulson.

“We went to the store to find something to contribute,” said Steve.

“You didn’t have to do that,” said Hillary.

“Well, Cap was afraid if we didn’t get something we’d run out of food,” said Coulson as he placed a box of crackers on the table.

Hillary got a nudge from her brother. “So, um, I’d like you to meet my brother Cody. Cody, this is --”

“Hi, I’m Steve,” said Steve, grabbing Cody’s hand to shake it firmly.

“Hi, it’s so cool to finally meet you,” said Cody. “I mean, I’ve heard so much about you, of course.”

“A lot of people have,” said Steve. “Good to meet you.”

Mark Lawson was the last one to arrive. Hillary had been anxious to see him all day--anxious to see him since they had landed in Phoenix last night, as a matter of fact. While the   
other guests were arriving she had distracted herself by playing Christmas carols on the piano, pausing to look up whenever somebody entered. Steve was listening to her play “Ding Dong Merrily on High” when Jo and Trey called out to Mark as he came through the kitchen door. Hillary finished the chorus hastily and got off the piano bench, nearly knocking it over in the process, and Steve had to get out of the way for dear life.

Wanda watched as Hillary ran around the counter and threw herself onto Mark to hug him. They pulled apart and he looked at her sort of expectantly, but then she gave a little, awkward laugh and asked how he was doing. One of these days they would kiss, but they were both scared to do it at that moment. 

Hillary brought Mark into the living room. 

“Lawson! Get over here!” said Steve, perking up.

“Cap, oh my gosh, how are you?” Mark crossed the living room. He held out his hand to shake with Steve, but Steve pulled him into a hug. Mark laughed. “Oh my gosh, normally you don’t hug me! How’s Avenging going?”

“It’s going,” said Steve soberly. 

“Aw, you’re doing great. Don’t let the haters get to you. So, I, er, met your best friend a while back.”

Steve gave a laugh that sort of sounded like a cough. “Really?”

“That was a while ago, Mark,” said Hillary, her hand leaning on Mark’s shoulder.

“He tried to crash our first date,” Mark told Steve.

“Apparently it didn’t work,” Steve smirked.

“Yeah, well, anyway, he’s a great guy. I hope you find him.” 

Steve sighed. “If he lets me.”

Mark laughed. “But seriously, though, I was sorry to hear about what happened in New Mexico. Just awful. And of course Jamie Sneld joining the Dark Side and everything--”

“The Dark Side? What, is she a Sith?”

“No, she’s just...made terrible life choices...not unlike some Sith lords or some wannabe Sith,” Mark shrugged. (Hillary coughed “spoilers!”) “Seriously, I knew her. I would never have thought she’d do something like that.”

“Yeah, well, it’s too bad for everyone we knew,” said Hillary. Hillary turned him around and introduced him to her S.H.I.E.L.D. friends. 

“Mark Lawson, weren’t you the friend of hers that was working for Resser Fruits…?” Agent Kearns started.

“Yeah, that was a while back,” said Mark. “I’ve since changed jobs.”

Hillary brought him over to the dining table where her parents were sitting with Cody, Coulson, and Wanda.

“Good to see you again, Mark, how are you?” said Coulson, shaking hands with him.

“Doing great, sir,” said Mark warmly.

“Now, are you going home for Christmas?”

“Yes, I’m leaving on Tuesday, as a matter of fact,” said Mark. Hillary leaned her head on his shoulder, wishing he didn’t have to leave. Mark gave her hand a squeeze. “How’s the weather on the east coast?”

“When I left D.C., it was blowing. You’re from Virginia, right?”

“Maryland,” Mark corrected.

“Maryland, sorry,” said Coulson.

“How’s Hedwig doing?” asked Mark.

“She’s doing fight. I sent her on a special errand for Christmas, though.”

“Okay.”

“But she loves being with me in D.C.,” said Coulson, smiling. “Sometimes I send her to the other departments at S.H.I.E.L.D. to annoy people.”

“I thought when the Ministry of Magic used owls they made a terrible mess?” said Marks.

“Hedwig isn’t messy,” said Coulson. “She knows how to get stuff done, though.”

Mark sniffed. “I get it. You use her to pressure people.”

“Well…” Coulson threw his hands in the air, trying to shrug and not look guilty.

Mark looked over at Wanda. “And how are you doing, Wanda? Is Cap still driving you crazy?”

“Well, he drives me less crazy than he does some of the other Avengers.”

“Well, do the other Avengers drive you crazy?”

Wanda sniffed. “No. Natasha tries, but I think she knows it’s a lost cause at this point.”

Mark laughed. “You guys are amazing.”

“Well, you guys can talk later,” said Hillary, “but Mark needs to get himself some food. He’s very hungry.”

“Sure, I’ll be back,” Mark said, giving a little wave to the four seated at the table. Wanda soon left the table to join the conversation in the living room. The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents   
talked about the ‘good old days’ before Hydra had come out, reminiscing about past assignments and old adventures. Steve shared a few stories about when he had worked for S.H.I.E.L.D. and even stuck in one or two stories about the Howling Commandos. Agent Parsons had met Peggy Carter years and years ago, before her retirement, and of course he had a few tall tales to tell about her. Cody lapped up everything eagerly. Hillary and Mark were on the couch, holding hands and cuddling.

Agent Kearns was telling a story about the time he had confiscated exotic weapons smuggled from Africa when there was a knock on the front door.

There was a family standing on the front porch, and as soon as Jo Tanner opened the door they bust into singing “Joy to the World.” 

“Well, thank you all very much!” said Jo. “Do come in!”

“Thanks, but we won’t stay long,” said the father of the family. The mother handed a plate of goodies to Jo.

“What’s on the plate, Helen?” asked Jo.

“Homemade fudge,” said the mother, “Chocolate, peanut butter, and pecan.”

“Oh, wonderful!”

Agent Parsons leaned over in his chair to look at the people in the doorway. “Agent Neil, what are you doing here?”

The father of the family looked up. Embarrassment crossed his face when he saw the people gathered in the living room. “Oh, I’m sorry. Is now a bad time?”

“Nonsense! Now’s a great time!” Steve got up and crossed the floor to say hello.

Agent Neil looked shocked. “Well...Captain America...This is--”

“Pleasure to meet you,” Steve said, shaking hands.

“Cap and I went to S.H.I.E.L.D. school together, Agent Neil,” said Hillary from the couch.

Agent Neil introduced himself and his family. Steve called Wanda to come forward and meet the Neils as well. Agent Neil was secretly assigned to watch over the Tanner family.

“Of course we don’t want to just be the secret agents creepily watching over you all the time,” Neil said heartily to Trey. “We’re neighbors, for heaven’s sake.”

“Well, it would look suspicious if we only brought treats to the Tanners, so don’t worry, we’re taking some to our other friends as well,” said Susan Neil. 

“Of course, Susan,” said Jo. “Thank you for stopping by, anyhow.”

“Of course, we had no idea the Avengers would be stopping over tonight,” said Agent Neil, laughing. 

“No harm done,” said Steve pleasantly. Steve explained his reason for visiting to Agent Neil.

“We’ll, you’ll have to send me the powerpoint from that,” said Agent Neil.

“We didn’t make a powerpoint,” said Wanda.

“I can send you my notes!” Marcie called from across the room.

Neil smirked. “I’ll...take you up on that.” He looked at Trey. “We’ve intruded long enough. But thanks for letting us in.”

“Oh, it’s always a pleasure to have you over,” said Trey. “It’s good to be neighbors and friends, you know, and not just have you on our speed-dial in case of emergency. That’s why we have all of these people over.” They shook hands, and the Neils said goodnight and left.

Steve and Wanda and Jo and Trey returned to the living room to re-join the party. Mark and Hillary got up about a minute later to get some more of Marcie’s cookies. Wanda was up at the same time to get a drink of water and she observed Hillary and Mark interacting for a minute.

“So do you like having a family living down the street from you guys actually spying on you?”

“No I don’t,” she said, giggling. “I mean, I do feel better that S.H.I.E.L.D. is watching my family. But every so often I get updates from Agent Neil, ‘oh, hey, you’re family’s doing just fine,’ or ‘Hydra isn’t anywhere close to your neighborhood.’ It’s kind of annoying, to be honest. I wish they wouldn’t say anything unless there actually was a problem. It’s not like I’m constantly worrying that Hydra is going to break in at any minute.”

“I know you don’t worry,” said Mark. 

“The way Coulson talks sometimes I wonder if I worry enough.”

“Well, hey, Hydra hasn’t been here since late April. Maybe they’ve figured out to leave you guys alone. But I was wondering, though, is S.H.I.E.L.D. watching me?”

“Do you want them to be watching you?”

“Do you?” 

“No. I know you can take care of yourself.”

“Well does S.H.I.E.L.D. know that?”

“Coulson knows that.” Hillary was holding onto Mark’s shoulders, and he was holding her back.

Mark smirked. “Well, good for him.” 

Hillary kissed his cheek. “I’m gonna go to the bathroom,” she said. “I’ll be right back.” Their hands slowly untangled as Hillary walked away. Mark watched her and looked away   
only reluctantly when she disappeared down the hall. That was when he noticed Wanda.

“So how long have you two been dating?”

“You mean how long have we been in a relationship or how long have we been dating? I took her out on our first date in April. I’ve known her longer, though,” said Mark. He smiled as he glanced down the hallway.

Wanda hesitated only for a moment. “Do you love her?”

Mark looked at Wanda.

“What makes you say that?”

“It’s my powers,” she said. “I know what the mind of a person in love--I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be prying--”

“No, it’s okay,” Mark cut her off. Then he closed his mouth uncertainly.

“You know how you feel about her,” said Wanda. She stepped closer to him and spoke more quietly. “Why are you holding back?”

“Holding back, me?”

“Yes. You haven’t told her--well, you have--”

“We’ve talked about getting married, yes,” said Mark. “I do want to be with her. For the rest of my life, yes. For forever, even--”

“I know.”

Mark sighed. He looked sad for some reason. He felt sad. And afraid. “But getting married--that’s a huge step. I don’t want to bring that up unless that’s what she wants, too.”

“Does she want it?”

“Yes--I mean, she wants to get married, in the sense that yes, she would like to be married to someone, someday. But--”

“Mark, I can tell you for a fact that she’s not going to put her career ahead of you,” said Wanda.

“I know, that’s what she’s told me, she doesn’t want to be a hardcore secret agent for the rest of her life.”

“But then what are you afraid of?”

“Well...just the thought...what if she isn’t the one?”

“What do you mean what if?” 

“I mean, yeah, I kind of personally reject the idea of soul mates, but what if we’re not really the two people who would do good in a marriage? What if we’re not really as   
compatible as we think we are? What if...us being together isn’t right?”

Wanda looked at Mark quizzically. “This isn’t you doubting, Mark, this is just anxiety. It’s normal. Everyone gets it.”

“Do you see it in everyone?”

“More than you’d think,” said Wanda. “Mark, if you want her, then she is the one. So just tell her. And stop doubting yourself.”

“But if she doesn’t want me--?”

“She does. And she’s not going to change her mind about that anytime soon. Just tell her before--” Wanda suddenly thought of something. Then she stopped herself.

“Before what?”

“Before...well, it’s a risky occupation, being a secret agent. Just let her know as soon as possible.”

Wanda felt Hillary’s presence return to the room. She patted Mark on the hand and went back to her seat while Mark waited for Hillary to come back to him. When they got back to the couch, they were holding hands. And Mark seemed reassured, by what Wanda had told him. 

It was a short while after that that some of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents started leaving. Jo encouraged everyone to take home the leftovers with them, though there wasn’t much left, just a lot of celery sticks and a few smokies. Marcie’s plate of cookies was covered with crumbs but not much else. Pretty soon it was just Steve, Cody and Hillary talking in the corner of the couch, and then Cody went to go to his room and said goodnight to Steve. Trey and Coulson went to the backyard for some fresh air. Wanda was helping Jo clean up the kitchen, since Hillary and Steve wanted some time to talk. And they got around to the subject dearest to both of them very quickly.

“So that picture on the piano,” Steve began, “when was that taken?”

“Back in April sometime. I don’t know,” said Hillary. “Mom must’ve gotten him to pose--which, I don’t think he would’ve done that for me. But he’d clean up and go to church with us sometimes. He’s pretty quiet out in public.”

“Yeah, I figured.”

“And he didn’t like getting his picture taken, normally.” Hillary opened up the photo album app on her phone. “But once, when I was flying home from East Europe, he got a hold of Mom’s phone and started sending me selfies.”

“Selfies? Bucky?” Hillary held up her phone and Steve leaned closer to look. “Oh my gosh.” He laughed. 

“I think he mostly did it to prove what a pain in the butt he is.”

“Did he really give you a hard time?”

“When he was feeling perky,” said Hillary. 

Steve gave a particularly loud, gasping laugh. “You’ll have to send me some of these.”

“I will.” Hillary put her phone down to go through some different photos. “It’s the least I can do for you. I know you’re probably jealous.”

“Jealous? I’m just glad he didn’t have my number.”

“Well, you were out Avenging all spring,” said Hillary.

“True.”

“I guess it was his way of showing me affection--being annoying, I mean. I’m sorry if it’s not what the Bucky you knew would have--”

“Oh, no, it’s fine,” said Steve. “I’m glad you were friends with him, Hillary.”

Hillary shrugged. “Well...thanks. I guess it’s funny to be hearing that from you. I mean, I didn’t even want him to stay. But Dad came in and…”

“Well, that was his decision.”

Hillary looked Steve in the eye. “I hope you realize how much it hurt, when he made me promise I couldn’t tell anyone. It pained me. It really did.”

“I’ve figured that out,” said Steve. “I guess if he’s just trying to protect himself then let him.” Steve sounded a bit gloomy saying that, however.

Hillary held up her phone. “Here. This was when he took me to a New Year’s Eve dance last year.”

“Aw, that was nice of him.”

“Well, I asked him. He seemed to have a good time. Danced with me a couple of times, even asked some girls he didn’t know. He likes to dance--did he know how to do that   
before--”

“Yes, he did. He was a phenomenal dancer...and I had two left feet, even after the serum. Still do.” 

Hillary laughed. “Which is why you purposefully avoid having a social life.”

“Yes.”

Hillary opened up something else on her phone. “And right before he left, he remembered something else he used to do. Mom sent me this.” 

They were watching a video. Wanda could hear the recording from across the room. It started out with someone talking.

“How’s the sound?” Hillary asked.

“It’s fine,” Steve answered hastily, his eyes focused intently on the video. Then the music started. It was “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” being played on piano. It was a slow, simplified arrangement, and the player made occasional mistakes. 

“Oh my gosh,” Steve breathed when it was over. 

“Are you okay?” Hillary asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Steve was rubbing his eyes. 

“Yeah, I know that...he hasn’t remembered everything. He isn’t the same person he used to be, not by a long shot. But he is taking the time to put his life back together...or at least he was, a few months ago. I don’t know how he’s been since Grace…”

Steve was leaning over on the couch. 

“So what was he like,” he asked, “when he was with you guys?”

“Well, Dad would try to get him out of the break room occasionally and teach him some stuff, but most of the time he just stayed in there and looked at the ceiling. When he was with my folks or with anyone else he’d just be by himself. Didn’t talk much. He’d just stare into space. And he had nightmares almost every night. It was really hard for him. He didn’t say much. He didn’t ask for help. But we made it a point to be there for him. And of course, when I’d come home, I’d talk to him to make sure he was okay. He’d talk to me more readily than most, I’ve heard. And I’d try to include him, when the rest of the family was doing something, or if we were bored I’d get him to play cards with me. He liked that. He’s an excellent hugger.”

“Always has been,” Steve sniffed. He was smiling. 

“Yeah, I bet. And he really liked to listen when I played the piano for him. After he figured out how to play again we’d do duets together...wish I’d figured out how to get him to do that sooner. If you ever found him, well--bring him back for a visit, at least.”

Steve shrugged non-committally. 

“Look...I just want you to know...you did read the email I sent you after he left, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, well...Bucky was...one of the best people I’ve ever known. Just so...sincere and sweet and honest. I didn’t want to keep him away from you, I really didn’t. I just...couldn’t   
help like having him around, after a while.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” said Steve. “I’ve forgiven you. And you know, if you and your family were able to take care of my best friend for a little while, then I’m grateful.”

“Well...thanks for sharing your best friend with me, I guess.”

“Aw, Hillary.” Steve and Hillary hugged on the couch.

Coulson and Trey returned inside just as they broke apart. 

“Are you ready to go, Steve?”

“Yeah, I suppose,” said Steve. “It was good talking with you, Hillary.”

“You too,” said Hillary. They both stood up.

Steve and Coulson got their jackets and said their goodnights to everyone. Steve gave Hillary a final hug. Jo was sure to invite them over for Sunday dinner the next day, since their flights weren’t until the evening. After that, Jo and Trey retired to their bedroom. 

While Hillary was playing the piano, Wanda sat down to enjoy the Christmas tree for a moment. She missed her and Natasha’s tree back at their apartment, but this one was nice to look at, at least. She let her eyes wander upwards towards the angel. And then she noticed something.

She stood up for a closer look at the tree-topper. The angel wore a gauzy robe of white and gold and held a star in one hand. She had an emotionless, almost haughty face, evenly proportioned with painted brown eyes. The hair was a golden red that shone in the LED lights behind the halo. The angel was beautiful, there was no mistaking that. But there was something strange about that face. She reminded Wanda of something. Maybe it was a person she should have known but had forgotten.

Hillary opened a Christmas songbook. She played a melancholy introduction and began to sing quietly:

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas,  
make the Yuletide gay.  
From now on our troubles will be miles away.  
Have yourself a merry little Christmas,  
let your heart be light.  
From now on our troubles will be out of sight.  
Here we are as in olden days,   
happy golden days of yore.  
Faithful friends who are dear to us  
coming near to us once more.  
Through the years we all will be together  
if the Fates allow.  
Until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow.  
So have yourself a merry little Christmas now.”

Hillary was thinking of Steve. And of the friend that they both missed. She was playing the song for Bucky even though he was nowhere near them. 

Hillary put her head in her hands and groaned softly. There was nothing she could do...except to hope. But she didn’t have much hope left for Bucky, not after what had happened in New Mexico. 

Wanda didn’t understand it. Hillary was a beautiful girl who had everything in life going for her. Did she have to be sad over this?

 

Wanda wasn’t sure what to do with herself otherwise on Sunday morning, so she went with the Tanners to church. The church was having a Christmas program, and Hillary played a piano solo for the congregation, “Once in Royal David’s City.” At least Wanda was there to support her, and she liked Christmas music anyway.

After church, Wanda and Hillary helped Jo get ready for dinner. In addition to Steve and Coulson and herself, their other dinner guests that day were Hillary’s oldest brother Mike and his wife and children. Their youngest son, Joey, was eight months old and very fun to play with. Steve and Trey pulled out the extra leaves of the dining table and Hillary and Cody set the table. The main course was a pork roast with a side of mashed potatoes and salad. After dinner, Wanda was excused from cleaning the kitchen, so she laid down on the couch to digest and was joined by the family’s cat, Mudder, who remembered her from her last visit and seemed to like her better. 

About an hour after Mike’s crew left, Wanda was almost asleep on the couch with the cat curled up on the crook of her arm when Steve called to her. She sat up, and the cat jumped off of her.

“Wanda, Coulson and I are leaving now,” said Steve. “We’re going to the airport.”

“Oh, that’s right,” said Wanda. She swung her legs off the couch. “You are going to Portland for Christmas, are you not?”

“Yes I am,” said Coulson, checking his watch. “I told Elaine I’d be there tomorrow--but I found an earlier flight so I thought I’d surprise her.”

“You’ll have to tell us how it goes,” said Hillary.

“Well, you’ll hear all about it,” Coulson said to her. She gave him a big hug. “Merry Christmas, boss.”

“You too, Tanner.”

“Hey, don’t keep us out of the loop,” said Steve.

“Of course I won’t, Cap,” said Coulson. 

Steve hugged Hillary goodbye. They told each other ‘Merry Christmas,’ and Hillary looked at him like she was sorry that, for the second year in a row, she couldn’t get him the Christmas present he really wanted.

“Hey, you’ll be okay,” said Steve. “You just have fun with your family, all right?”

“All right,” said Hillary.

“So who are you spending Christmas with, Steve?” asked Wanda.

“Well, I always make it a point to go back to Brooklyn,” said Steve. “As much as it’s not Christmas in Brooklyn without...the people I once knew. But I have a few distant cousins who live in Queens that like to have me over. I’ll be staying with them. And some of Bucky’s...relatives are having a get-together on Tuesday night, they’ve invited me, of course. Oh, and Christmas Eve I’ll be at Stark Tower.”

“Of course,” said Wanda.

“Yeah, Tony’s been so generous to me all these years. And I haven’t seen him for a while. It’s the least I can do.” 

“Tell him hi from me.”

“Will do. Say hello to Nat and Barton.”

Wanda hugged Steve. 

“Merry Christmas.”

“You too.”

Wanda leaned up on her toes to kiss Steve’s cheek.

“Do I get one too?” asked Coulson. 

“If you ask nicely.”

“Please?”

Wanda hugged Coulson gently and pecked his cheek as well. “And tell us when Hedwig comes home.”

“We’ll do that,” said Steve as he and Coulson gathered their jackets from the counter. They exchanged handshakes and hugs with Jo and Trey and Cody Tanner before waving a final goodbye.

Wanda was treated to more of Hillary’s piano music that Sunday night, and she also played a few rounds of Uno with the family later on. Wanda sat next to Cody. She thought she detected a faint blush once or twice when he was looking at her, and he froze whenever their fingers accidentally touched. But if he had any feelings for her, he was trying very hard to push them away.

 

Wanda’s flight was at eleven in the morning on Monday. She said goodbye to the family at nine before Hillary took her to the airport. She and Cody awkwardly hugged and apologized right afterward. Hillary made no comment, however, when they got in her car and drove away.

“So does Hawkeye have anything fun planned for when you get there?” Hillary asked her. Hillary was wearing an unbuttoned gray coat and a pale blue beret. Wanda was in her red peacoat and wool hat. 

“No, I don’t know,” said Wanda. “I suppose I shall wait and see. But I think we were going to take the kids to see Star Wars. That should be fun.”

Hillary nodded. “Barton’s kids are huge Star Wars fans, I hear--which, considering--it’s not surprising.”

“What?”

Hillary was thinking of Emily Bridger. But so did a lot of people, when it came to Star Wars. Wanda guessed she would find out why.

“Have you been to visit Barton’s family before?”

“Mm-hm, Natasha took me twice last summer.”

“Oh, cool. Is it true they have chickens?”

Wanda laughed. “Barton actually isn’t all that into animals. Laura takes care of them.”

“I get it. He’s a hawk. Let me guess he kills them for her.”

“Natasha once told me that ...well Barton might not like me gossiping about him...I’ll tell you anyway, Natasha once said that Cooper once asked if he could get a pet rabbit. Barton said he’d have to be okay with raising it for meat. That changed his mind pretty fast.”

“Hm, I’ll bet. You ever had rabbit meat?”

“No. You?”

“No. And that’s saying something, because I’ve eaten a lot of strange stuff, working for S.H.I.E.L.D.. And that was off-duty, but someone else usually buys. So I get paid to eat live snails and squid sushi for S.H.I.E.L.D..”

“This is why Steve makes the Avengers’ staff pack food for us.”

“Really?”

“Well, mostly to save money.”

“Well, that’s smart of him, I guess. Wait, how did we get on this topic?”

They talked and laughed together all the way to the airport. When they got to the curb, Hillary parked and helped Wanda to get her suitcase out. And then Hillary gave Wanda a big hug.

“It’s been so nice seeing you. I love having you come visit. You should come more, you know, when you’re not Avenging.”

Wanda smirked. “Thanks for being a good friend.”

“You’re welcome. If you ever need anything, and all that.”

Wanda turned to walk away with the handle of her rolling suitcase out. “Of course, Hillary. I’ll take you up on that. Merry Christmas.”

“Same to you. See ya.” Hillary gave a little wave and got back in her car. 

Wanda strolled confidently into the terminal. She had flown before, of course, but never by herself. She got her bag checked without complication. Going through security was a hassle, having to wait in line for twenty minutes and then remove her coat and shoes and other items to have them scanned and put them back on again. Wanda was sure that her powers could have sensed if anyone in that terminal was carrying explosives, but she was pretty sure that objecting to the security measures wasn’t worth it. Not today, anyway.  
The flight to Des Moines, Iowa, was uneventful. The landscape out the window got flat way too quickly so she mostly tried to sleep. She had a long enough layover there to buy herself a decent lunch. From Des Moines she flew to Louisville, Kentucky, which was the closest major airport to the Bartons’ in southern Indiana. Between Phoenix and Louisville the world had turned from brown to white, and through the gap between the plane and the walkway Wanda felt a stab of icy air.

She turned on her phone and texted Natasha to say she’d landed. Natasha sent an immediate reply saying to call her.

“Hey there!” Natasha said when she’d dialed her number. 

“Hello, Natasha.”

“Good to hear your voice, girl,” said Natasha.

“You too.”

“How was the Tanners’ ?” 

“Pretty good. It was pretty good. So where are you?”

“I’m about half an hour away driving-wise. You got your bag yet?”

“No. I suppose it’ll give me something to do.”

“Yes. You do that. I’ll call you when I’m close. And don’t text me again unless you physically cannot talk. This is not the best weather for texting while driving.” It was snowing only lightly outside the airport, but Wanda figured there could be heavier weather elsewhere. 

They hung up. Wanda went to the bag claim. She had her suitcase in ten minutes, so she spent the next fifteen sitting on a bench near the luggage carousel, watching the other travelers: happy families with young children, middle-aged and elderly couples, groups of adults who greeted each other with warm hugs and broad smiles. The Christmas music playing over the speakers here was loud and twangy and added to the folksy atmosphere created by posters of brown horses and white painted fences.

A small car pulled up at the curb and Natasha Romanoff walked into the terminal with a swish of the automatic doors, looking posh in her black skinny jeans, black leather coat, and black fur hat.

“Natasha!” Wanda jumped up to give her friend a hug.

“How you doin’ ?”

“Good. You said you’d call.”

“I’ve been to this airport often enough. Let me take your bag.” Natasha took Wanda’s rolling suitcase. “So how was the flight?”

“It was long. Boring. What does one do on an airplane? They hardly let you take anything through security.”

“You’d be surprised, actually.” 

Natasha put Wanda’s suitcase in the back seat, and Wanda got in the passenger’s seat and Natasha left the curb. Wanda had about decided she’d had enough of airports and airplanes for a while. 

“Here, check this out,” said Natasha, handing her phone to Wanda. It was open to a picture that Coulson had sent her via text of him kissing Elaine. There was a caption: “She loved her surprise.”

“Ohhhh,” said Wanda. “It is so sweet.” 

“So tell me about Arizona,” said Natasha.

Wanda told Natasha about the S.H.I.E.L.D. workshop and the Christmas party. Wanda did mention that Hillary had showed Steve her pictures of Bucky, to which Natasha replied, “Good for him.” They got a text from Barton asking where they were, and Wanda sent a reply for Natasha. 

After driving down a short stretch of highway in the city, Natasha took them down a broad city street that went to a country road that stretched for miles and miles over snow-blanketed hills. Snowflakes flew around them in the air as they drove. Natasha told her that all of the presents they had shipped had arrived, and Laura had a table set up in her room where they could wrap whatever still needed wrapping.

There was a reason that Clint Barton never flew commercial when he could just fly a private jet to his house. Louisville was a long two-hour drive away from his refuge. And even that was in good weather and traffic conditions. Natasha was going slow so it took them two and a half hours. They stopped in the small town not far from Barton’s to use the restroom and stretch. By that time it was nearly dark. The road between Barton’s and the town was covered with snow, and they had to drive painfully slow behind a snowplow for part of the way.

Finally they came to a gate, and Natasha got out to open it. Wanda did offered to open it with her powers, but Nat declined, saying she needed the exercise anyway. She got back in, pulled through, and then got out to close the gate behind them.

When that was finished, they drove a short way through a snowy wood and then over a hill. On the far side of the little valley they could see the lights on in the Bartons’ house and the outline of the barn. Wanda gave a small sigh, and Natasha had a smile of satisfaction on her lips: this was coming home.

As they pulled up the car in front of the house Wanda could see the children’s shadows crossing the windows. When they parked, the porch light came on and Laura opened the front door, leaving the screen closed until Natasha and Wanda were on the porch. Laura gave Wanda a hug.

“Welcome back, Wanda,” said Laura, smiling brightly. “We’ve missed you.” 

“Auntie Wanda! I’m so excited you came for Christmas!” shouted Lila. Wanda leaned down to hug her.

“Hello, my dear, I’ve missed you!” Cooper gave her a hug as well. “Where is Baby Nate?”

“Sleeping. He just has a big dinner,” said Laura.

“And where’s Clint?” Her question was answered by a man’s voice shouting from the barn. They heard footsteps running through the snow up to the porch. Natasha whipped around and jumped off the porch steps to dive-bomb Clint into the snow and hug him.

“You’ve only been gone for like five hours, Nat, did you miss me that much?” asked Clint as he struggled out of the snow with her on top of him. Laura was shaking her head and smiling.

“I always miss you, Barton.” Natasha finally let go of him and let him get up. Clint dusted the snow off of his jacket and pants. He’d been working in the barn and looked a little dusty. But his face lit up when he saw Wanda.

“Wanda, how are you, kid?”

“Clint, it’s been too long,” said Wanda.

“I know. Come here.” Wanda stepped down the porch to give Clint a big hug. “We don’t get you here nearly often enough, but I’m so glad you came for Christmas! I really am!”

“All right, let’s get Auntie Wanda inside,” said Laura. “Come on.” The little Bartons and Laura stood aside to let Wanda through. Natasha picked up Wanda’s suitcase where she had left it on the porch and followed.

The Bartons had a coat rack next to their door, already heavy with coats and hats and the floor beneath it covered with boots. Wanda wiped her feet and took off her coat and hat to place them over a coat that was probably Cooper’s. “Wow, this is what we need for our apartment, Natasha, a coat rack.”

“Heck yes,” Natasha breathed. Clint closed the door and kicked the snow off of his boots.

“You’ll be staying upstairs with Nat,” Clint said to Wanda. 

“Hey Clint,” said Natasha, unlocking her phone screen.

“Hey what?”

She showed him the picture of Coulson and Elaine.

“Ah-HA! Finally! I’ll have to send him a text when I get a minute.”

“I’ll remind you,” said Natasha.

“Dinner’s almost ready,” Laura called from the kitchen. And after Wanda had put her suitcase upstairs, she sat down to a hot dinner of soup and bread with Natasha, Clint, Laura, Lila, and Cooper.

“You timed it just right,” said Natasha.

The conversation hovered around Wanda’s trip and Natasha’s and Clint’s experiences with civilian air transport in the past while they ate. After they had finished, Clint let the children go off to play, and he asked Wanda about her trip to Arizona and what had gone on there. Satisfied with her report, Clint went upstairs to work on the computer while Wanda and Natasha helped Laura clean up.

Wanda unpacked her things and then went to Clint and Laura’s room to help Natasha wrap their presents for the family. When they were finished, they carried the wrapped bundles downstairs. Cooper and Lila both teased them about what they were doing, but the lady Avengers managed to get the presents under the tree, nearly doubling the amount of packages from the amount present. 

“This is actually small for Barton’s,” said Natasha. “He’s on leave from S.H.I.E.L.D..”

“Luckily the kids don’t ask for much.”

“Yeah, well, he spoils them rotten.” Which was only partly true.

Wanda loved the festive decorations in the house. In the hallway there were garlands of artificial boughs over the archways and wrapped around the stair rails. The living room had yellow lights in each of its three big windows. The tree was a live one that smelled sweet when you leaned close to sniff it, and it was covered with a hodgepodge of ornaments as well as a paper chain that Lila had made. Laura had already hung up both of the ornaments Natasha and Wanda had sent. The tree topper was a red-robed, regal-looking Santa Claus. Baby Nate woke up from his nap, and Laura brought him into the living room to play with his siblings and aunties while Clint built a fire in the fireplace.

After everyone else had gone to bed, Wanda came back down to the living room by herself to enjoy the lights and the fire. She’d brought her silky red bathrobe with her from her apartment, and under that she was wearing a new pair of flannel pajamas she’d found at Walmart a few weeks ago. It was the best feeling in the world, to lie down on the couch and enjoy the beautiful Christmas lights and the snow falling gently outside, in a house full of people that loved her.

Wanda had to smile to herself when she saw the little framed photograph of Pietro that was on the side table. He was there in more ways than one. 

 

She didn’t want to get out of bed the next morning. The old mattress was so soft and comfortable and the blankets on top kept her very warm. But then Natasha flung off the covers and let in the cold air. Wanda tried curling up under the blankets again, but after a few minutes she heard the children running downstairs and decided it was no use.

Natasha and Laura made scrambled eggs and bacon for everyone, and the adults all had steaming mugs of coffee. As soon as the breakfast dishes were cleaned up, Cooper and Lila said they wanted to go play outside in the snow and wanted Natasha and Wanda to come with them. Wanda’s peacoat wasn’t exactly fit for playing in the snow, but Clint found an old coat of his for her to wear, as well as some rain boots that had once belonged to Laura. He also gave her a gray scarf and hat that he was keeping in a box in the back of the closet and a pair of black winter gloves. 

“These used to be Emily’s,” said Clint when he was fitting the scarf over Wanda.

“I’ll take care of them,” said Wanda.

“You don’t have to.”

Wanda was the last to come outside, and Natasha was already out in the yard with Cooper and Lila throwing snowballs. The cold air was brisk and the sky was gray. 

“Wanda!” Lila shouted, running up to her. “Can you build a snowman with your powers? Like Elsa can in Frozen?”

“Yeah!” Cooper encouraged her.

“Well, I’ll try,” said Wanda feebly. She started sending out jets of red energy to move the snow on the ground in front of them. The hex ended up melting the snow a little as it came into contact. She couldn’t make more than a little mound that maybe had some kind of spiral going around it. Natasha smirked.

“I’ll work on it,” said Wanda.

So they built a snowman the old-fashioned way. Cooper was pretty strong and could scoop a large pile of snow into a ball, rolling it about fifteen feet and the others packing on snow as he went. But Natasha provided the manpower for lifting the middle section. Wanda and Lila made a ball for the head and sculpted the features on the ground. It was hard to find rocks and twigs buried under the snow so their snowman had a built-on nose and mouth and two hollowed indents for the eyes. 

Cooper bravely ran to the woodpile in the barn to get two sticks for the arms--he managed to sneak in before his father noticed, and he got away just as Clint heard a noise and shouted “Hey!”. Clint didn’t like his kids taking from the woodpile, but he leaned out the barn door to watch Cooper running back across the yard. He was actually impressed with the snowman.

Natasha hefted the snowman’s head onto the body, Wanda aiding her a little with her powers. The two ladies smoothed out the sides of the snowman so he looked nice and stuck in the arms. 

Wanda slumped down next to the snowman. “Who knew building a snowman was hard work? I’m exhausted.”

“That’s your workout for today, pansy,” said Natasha. “You can go back to bed now.”

“No, I just got here!”

“Let’s build another one!” said Cooper.

“Yeah!” said Lila.

“No, Auntie Nat is tired too,” said Natasha, sitting down next to Wanda.

“Aww!” said Lila.

“No you’re not!” Cooper scowled.

“Well, I’m not so tired that I have to go back inside, kids,” said Natasha. “But I don’t think I’ve got the energy to build another snowman. Maybe tomorrow.”

Lila moaned again. 

Wanda took a few deep breaths. “Do you know if Clint and Laura had any plans for tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow, I’m not sure,” said Natasha. “But I think tonight we were going to see Star Wars.”

Wanda was about to respond when something cold and wet and powdery exploded in her face. She looked up at the children. Lila was laughing.

“I was aiming for Auntie Nat,” said Cooper.

“I knew that,” said Wanda.

Natasha leaned forward. “Well, if you want your aim to someday be as good as your daddy’s, kid,” Natasha started, scooping up some snow, “you’ve gotta be better than that. I can give you a few pointers. Lesson number one: aim.” 

Natasha threw a snowball at Cooper, and it hit him square in the chest. “Hey!” Cooper shouted. 

Natasha scrambled to her feet as she was padding together another snowball. Cooper hit her before she could fire. Lila started throwing snowballs at both Wanda and Natasha. Wanda got up and threw a few of her own. 

Cooper sent a large snowball to Wanda’s face. Reacting instinctively she used a hex to blow it up. 

“That was cool, do it again!” 

“Not unless you make me!” Wanda scooped up a snowball and threw it at Cooper. Remarkably, they all felt less tired after their snowball fight than before. Then Lila suggested that they make snow angels. And they did. Wanda got her hair wet from lying on her back, but she laughed about it afterward. 

Laura came out to the porch while they were playing. She had baby Nate in her arms, dressed in a hat and a cute little snowsuit. She walked by the railing and let him reach down to grab some of the snow piled there. Natasha lept up when she saw the baby, ruining her pristine snow angel. She went to the porch and played with little Nathaniel, pinching his cheeks and calling him her “sugar-baby” and kissing him.

“Can I take him?” said Natasha.

“Just be careful,” said Laura. Natasha took baby Nate in her arms and carried him off the porch, bouncing as they went. Baby Nate broke into the biggest smile and laughed. Natasha put him on her shoulders and carried him through the snow to the barn. Clint was inside working on fixing some equipment, but he put his tools down and came to caress little Nate’s face and pinch his nose.

Natasha brought him back out of the barn. 

“Can you put him in the snow, Auntie Nat?” asked Cooper.

“No, it’s too deep, he’ll be buried in it,” said Natasha. Baby Nate was leaning off of her shoulders and reaching for the white stuff on the ground as though he wouldn’t have objected. Natasha finally flung him off her shoulders and swung him around in her arms. 

Natasha handed Nate to Wanda for a minute. He pulled her hair and then he ripped off her hat and dropped it in the snow. 

“Be careful, that was cousin Emily’s,” said Lila.

Wanda used a hex to lift the hat back up to where she could grab it. The baby took notice of the floating hat and giggled loudly. 

“Do you like that?” said Wanda. “Do you like Auntie Wanda’s magic?”

Baby Nate leaned back and clapped. Wanda manipulated the floating hat a little more for his amusement as well as Cooper and Lila’s, dangling it within his reach and then pushing it away like it was a cat toy.

Wanda felt, and Natasha agreed, that it was all right to be showing her powers to the children. That way they wouldn’t be afraid of her the way too many adults were. It would just be normal to them. And the Bartons would always accept her, just the way she was. Natasha beamed at them, just happy. This little family was her life, Wanda included. And Wanda thought that there wasn’t any music that could sound sweeter than Nate’s laughter.

 

Laura liked it when Natasha came over and took the children to play outside, because that gave her time and space to make food for them. When they went back inside, Wanda handed back Nate to Laura as she told Cooper to go to the barn and tell their dad that lunch was ready. Laura had last night’s soup and toast made from homemade bread for them to eat. After lunch, Wanda and Natasha helped Laura and the children to make Christmas candy. Most of it was chocolate: several varieties of chocolate-dipped pretzels, chocolate lollipops and candies made in molds, and chocolate fudge. Wanda and Natasha took turns helping Lila and Cooper pour out the chocolate, making sure neither of them burned their fingers or snuck too many licks of the melted chocolate from the molds. 

The Bartons were planning on the seven o’clock showing of Star Wars at the movie theater in the small town up the road. At four, Clint came back in from the barn and took a shower. Natasha helped Laura with the baby while Wanda helped Lila pick out some nice clothes to wear. Evenings out for the Bartons were rare, and this one had been anticipated for a very long time. 

Clint got the gate on their drive out, and the road to town was cleared of snow and excess ice. The weather forecast on the car radio said a blizzard would be coming that night, but not until around one in the morning.

The movie theater was filled to capacity: fans having a night out, townspeople wanting to see what all the fuss was about, and folks from the country like the Bartons who’d brought their children. The audience wasn’t as responsive as the one at the Avengers’ staff screening the previous week. The children ‘oohed’ at the TIE fighters and the Millennium Falcon. The grown-ups laughed at the antics of Finn, Rey, and BB-8. Most everyone felt warmly towards Han Solo, and those seeing the film the first time were shocked by his tragic fate.

Clint and his family, of course, were watching for the first time. Like Steve and Coulson had, he hung on to every word that anyone mentioned about Luke Skywalker or the Jedi. He kind of snorted at Han Solo’s one-liners but didn’t really respond much. And a part of him was surprised at himself for paying so much attention to a Star Wars movie.

“I loved it!” Lila shouted as they exited the theater with the rest of the crowd after the showing.

“That was so amazing, Dad!” said Cooper. “Those stormtroopers were awesome, they hit everything, not like the lousy ones in the originals. And I loved the way the TIE fighters and the X-wings go NYOOOM! and PEW PEW PEW!” Cooper made a flying motion with his arms and started to circle away from him. Natasha grabbed him by his hoodie. “And Kylo Ren is so freaking awesome. I wanna be Kylo Ren for Halloween next year--can I be Kylo Ren?”

“No,” said Clint.

“Aw, Dad.”

“We’ll think about it, dear,” said Laura. 

“I liked BB-8! He was so cute!” shouted Lila. “I want a robot just like him!”

“It was certainly a fun movie,” Laura commented.

“Yes indeed,” said Natasha. “It’s even more fun the second time around.”

“Hm, we’ll have to do that for date night, honey,” said Laura. Clint smiled at her but didn’t say anything.

“I wanna be a stormtrooper!” said Cooper. “I wanna have a big electric stick like that one guy had, the guy who fought with Finn. Did you see that? That was so cool!”

Wanda laughed. “There’s something in Star Wars for everyone.”

“Auntie Nat, can you do my hair just like Rey’s?” asked Lila.

“I think I can,” said Natasha. “We’ll have to try that tomorrow.”

“Rey is so cool!” said Lila. “She can take care of herself. And she’s a Jedi now, just like cousin Emily!”

“Your cousin Emily is a Jedi?” asked Wanda. 

“Was a Jedi,” said Cooper. “She’s dead, remember?”

“Cooper, we don’t talk like that,” said Laura.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” said Clint. “Cooper, wanna come with me?”

“Sure,” said Cooper.

Natasha and Wanda followed Laura and Lila and baby Nate to the women’s bathroom. Nate had slept through most of the movie and was now fussing over a wet diaper. 

 

On the drive home, Lila and Cooper were still going on about how cool the movie was. Clint was lost in thought and trying to focus on the road. Wanda kept quiet while Natasha occasionally leaned forward to whisper odd tidbits she liked about the movie to Laura. 

“Daddy, what color was cousin Emily’s lightsaber?” Lila asked.

“It was green,” said Clint.

“Hm, Rey’s is blue. I want a green one like Emily had.”

“We have a lightsaber, Lila,” said Cooper.

“Not a toy one, a real one!” said Lila. “Daddy, did cousin Emily have her lightsaber with her when she went away?”

“She didn’t,” said Clint.

“She didn’t?” said Cooper, astonished.

“Well who has it?” asked Lila. “Do you?”

“It’s someplace safe,” said Clint. “But no, I don’t have it, honey. Don’t ask me about it again.” 

“You don’t have to be so hard, Clint,” said Laura.

“I wasn’t yelling, I was being firm,” said Clint, gripping the steering wheel tighter. “There’s a difference.”

“Honey, are you all right?”

Clint glanced at her. He also saw Natasha in his rearview mirror, looking at him with concern.

“I’m fine. I’ll tell you later.”

“Why do you always tell me later?”

“Well...you didn’t know Emily quite like I did.”

“Clint,” said Natasha.

Clint was silent for the rest of the drive. When they got home, he got baby Nate, asleep again, out of his carseat and carried him inside. He came out of the house again later to make sure no one had left anything in the car. When he’d locked the car, however, he saw Natasha waiting for him on the porch.

“What?”

“Clint, are you okay?”

“No. You know I’m not.”

“Well, do you need to talk about it?”

“I need a drink.”

“I’ll take you to town to get one. But go talk to Laura first. All right?”

Clint didn’t look at her, but he nodded. “All right.”

 

Natasha and Clint both went upstairs. Wanda, however, went back downstairs after she had taken off her dress boots. She observed Clint and Laura’s minds from a distance as they had a discussion in their bedroom. Clint was apologizing for his behavior earlier. He was explaining what it was about watching Star Wars that had upset him. Laura was understanding but she didn’t think he needed to take out his mood on everyone else.

Natasha was tucking the kids in bed. Clint came back downstairs. Wanda was in the living room by herself. The main light was off but the tree and window lights were on, casting a soft glow on the room.

Clint was surprised to see her. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to enjoy the Christmas lights,” said Wanda. “And to have some peace and quiet. Everyone else is upstairs.”

“Well, Laura and I weren’t exactly yelling,” said Clint. He looked down at Wanda. “So what can I do for you?”

“Can you tell me who Emily was?”

Clint sighed. “It’s not that easy to explain. Let me sit down.” Wanda moved over on the couch. Clint sat down next to her. He grabbed a framed photograph from the side table, one that Wanda hadn’t paid much attention to before. “This was us two years ago, before S.H.I.E.L.D. fell. I took Laura and the kids that year out to California to see some of Laura’s family, and Emily and her folks came with us. Emily is the girl in the middle. She’s wearing the scarf and hat I loaned you earlier--that was actually an early Christmas present from Steve.”

“Our Steve?”

“Yes.”

The photo showed a group of people wearing snow gear. Clint and Laura and Lila and Cooper were there, as well as a few people Wanda didn’t recognize. Emily stood in the center of the portrait with her arms around a middle-aged couple, the man wearing a cowboy hat. Emily had a round face and freckles and a broad smile, and her hair stuck out in brown braided pigtails from under the gray hat. She looked to be about Wanda’s age.

“Now, four years ago, thereabout, Thor first came to earth in New Mexico. Did you hear about that?” Clint asked her.

“Yes, I did,” said Wanda.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. was called in to investigate the hammer landing,” said Clint. “And I was asked to go in as additional security. Not that they really needed me--that’s another story, I suppose. But Coulson was there, too. It was on my way to the case that I first met Emily. Emily had been adopted by two distant relations of mine, George and Jean Bridger. At the time they were living on a ranch in southern Utah, just outside Moab. After the whole Thor incident, I drove back with Coulson and we stopped at their ranch for Sunday dinner. Emily seemed like a nice, friendly, normal girl, a little quiet, maybe too curious. Coulson thought she was harmless. In fact, he’d heard that she’d been having a difficult time getting a job, so he offered to get her a job at S.H.I.E.L.D.. They were partly through the application process when New York happened.” Clint stared at the photo for a few seconds before replacing it on the side table. “I needed a little R&R after that catastrophe, so I went to visit Jean and George again. Emily was devastated to hear what had happened to Coulson. But, of course, unbeknownst to both of us at the time, Coulson had been revived, and S.H.I.E.L.D. had been running a background check on Emily. 

“Now, a little life advice here, Wanda,” said Clint, smirking at her, “if you don’t want the government to find out about you, don’t apply to work for a government agency. As it turned out, about...almost ten years ago now, Emily had crash-landed on George and Jean’s ranch in a spaceship. She was from another planet. In fact, she was from a particular galaxy far, far, away. Emily--well, she’d had a different name back there, but we’ll just call her Emily--Emily was a Jedi apprentice, fought in the Clone Wars alongside her master. You’ve seen Revenge of the Sith, right?” Wanda nodded. “Well, anyway, Order 66 happened. Emily got on the first spaceship she could find and high-tailed it outta there. Somewhere on the trip she got pretty close to a black hole--she didn’t go in, but she got knocked off course and somehow landed here.” Clint shrugged. “So anyway, Emily wanted to find a place in this world. Coulson met with her in secret and invited her to join S.H.I.E.L.D. as a special agent. She agreed, but, as the story goes, she wasn’t allowed to tell anyone that Coulson was training her. Including the Avengers.”

“Including you,” said Wanda.

“Especially me,” said Clint. “Poor girl. I mean, S.H.I.E.L.D. training is rough on everyone, but having to keep a secret like that must’ve put her under a lot of stress. Especially ’cause the only other person who knew about Laura and the kids at the time was Nat. And Steve was with her for her second semester of S.H.I.E.L.D. school--that’s how she knew Hillary and all of them, too. But that didn’t make it easier. But, Emily completed the training program with flying colors, and she was one of our top supernatural field ops right up until Hydra came out.”

“But...Clint, the Force does not exist in this world.”

Clint sniffed. “That’s what you think. Emily couldn’t levitate stuff or make crap fly around like the Jedi did back there. But she could still feel the Force. It could tell her things. She could read the minds of people around her a little, kind of like you do. She could also predict the future to a point, know when to set off a bomb to attack an enemy, sense when there was danger around. Little things that made her useful. I went on an assignment once with her in Australia. She was like no one I’d ever worked with before...until you came along.”

Wanda nodded. “What happened?” she asked quietly.

Clint sighed, looking down at his lap. “Last year, some of Thor’s friends from Asgard came. Some kind of trouble back on their planet. I don’t recall the details. Thor was with the Avengers, of course, and he couldn’t help out, but he recommended Emily. Emily agreed to go. A few days after they had gone, they came back without her. They didn’t know what had happened.”

“So she was just...gone?”

“They had searched for her body but couldn’t find anything.”

“And her lightsaber?”

“She’d left it with Coulson. Coulson still has it in his office.”

Wanda gasped. “It is a fully-functioning lightsaber?”

“Tony Stark helped her to build it, but yes, she made it with of some eurekaite she’d found.”

But there was more. “That’s not the last you’ve heard of her, is it? Her vanishing on Asgard.”

Clint shook his head slowly. “I’ve told Laura but the kids don’t know, and neither does Nat. Less than a month ago, someone came to see me.”

“The Doctor.”

“Yes. That canoodling time traveler with the police box. He said he’d seen Emily and she was well. She’d somehow ended up in her home galaxy again. She survived...she survived the civil war, that you saw in the original trilogy.” Clint bit his lip. “But there was a letter he’d brought from her too. The letter said that she was going to help start the new Jedi order with Luke Skywalker. Well...tonight we found out what became of that. I doubt I’ll ever have definite proof. But Emily was probably murdered by Kylo Ren.”

Wanda breathed in.

“I’m not surprised,” said Clint. “Honestly, I’m not surprised. It’s just…”

“It hurts,” said Wanda.

Clint leaned forward with his head in his hands. He wasn’t crying but he was close. Wanda put her arm around Clint’s shoulder, remembering how he’d been there for her when Pietro died. 

Laura had tried to tell him upstairs that it was just a movie, that they had no proof of what actually happened. But if there was any truth to the first six films...

“I am so sorry,” said Wanda. “So sorry. To be separated from her, and then to know for sure that she is gone…”

“It’s all right,” said Clint, rubbing his eyes. “I’ve lost relatives closer to me than that.”

“Emily meant a lot to you, didn’t she?”

Clint smirked. “She grew on me, yeah. She’s a sweet kid. One heck of a warrior. Laura and the kids sure loved her. She didn’t deserve...well, whatever happened to her. But anyway,” Clint sat up straight.

“Who else knows about the letter, from the Doctor?”

“Steve and Coulson both know,” said Clint. “Emily was legally the only person allowed to talk to Coulson for like a year and a half outside of a few handpicked S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. And Emily and Steve were close. She even...she even went to help Steve look for Bucky, at one point. But that’s another story, I reckon. And I get the feeling Natasha’s going to find out, here in a bit.”

There was a pause. “Clint, I cannot take your cousin’s place. You know that.”

“I know. I didn’t ask you to.”

Natasha came down the stairs with heavy footfalls. “You ready to go, Clint?”

“Yeah, just give me a minute to get my jacket on. Got the car keys?”

“I’ll get them,” said Natasha, going to the key rack by the door.

“Wait, where are you going?” Wanda asked. Clint got off the couch and Wanda stood up as well.

“For a drink.” He went over to the door and got his coat on.

“At this hour of the night, are you serious?” 

“I have my designated driver.” 

“But, Clint, isn’t there a blizzard coming later tonight?”

Natasha put the car keys in her pocket. “I’ve driven in worse conditions before, trust me. I’ll get him home safe.”

Wanda watched in disbelief as Natasha and Clint stepped outside into the night.

 

Natasha had gotten a private dining room for herself and Clint. She knew that once he was properly inebriated that he would talk openly about his life’s secrets as well as the Star Wars spoilers.

But in one of his quieter moments, he put his bottle on the table and stared down. “Sometimes I really wonder if I can keep doing this, Natasha.”

“Doing what?”

“Being a superhero. I mean, I haven’t been in the field since Sokovia, but I haven’t been able to leave it behind. The question of me going back hangs over me and Laura and the kids all the time. It clouds everything we do together, I feel. They don’t need that. I don’t need that.”

“That’s reality, Clint. Is that a bad thing?”

“Well, for the last several months I’ve been able to pretend that that wasn’t my reality, Nat. I’ve gotten to raise my baby. I work on the farm and take care of the kids like a normal dad would. And I want to be a normal dad. I want a normal life. My family wants a normal life. And it’s not just me, keeping the kids home all the time is a strain on Laura.   
She’d like to do other things with her life. We could buy a place closer to town so the kids can go to school and have friends.”

“Are you serious?”

Clint took a drink and then wiped his lip. “I’ve been debating it,” said Clint. “I know if I officially retired from S.H.I.E.L.D. I could get full benefits. I could get a job or just make the farm a full-time gig, invest in some animals.”

“You know you’re more likely to get into debt that way.”

“That’s true. I haven’t really talked to Laura about it. But I know she’d like a change, a permanent one. And the kids would be happier, too. My family wants a normal life.”

“That’s bullcrap, Barton, and you know it,” said Natasha. “Your kids think it’s awesome that their daddy is Hawkeye. They don’t want to grow up to be superheroes but because of what you have done with the Avengers they can grow up to be whatever they want. They have a future. Everyone in your family hates it when you have to go away to work, Clint, but they know that what you’re doing is important.”

Barton snorted. “I’m not doing anything important. At least not before last year when the Avengers became a thing. I was helping S.H.I.E.L.D. with their secret spy stuff--and by extension helping Hydra.”

“S.H.I.E.L.D. did a lot of good work for humanity too, Clint. And they still do.” Natasha sighed. “It seemed like a lot of people forget that. And Clint, this is your skill set. This is what you love, more than fixing fences or driving that stupid tractor. Saving the world and shooting that bow. That makes you happy. And Laura knows that. She wants you to be happy. I want you to be happy. And you know what? I don’t think Emily would have wanted you to hang up the bow forever. Not when our world needs it.”

Clint gave Natasha a steely glare. “What about our world? Does it need me? It has you and Steve and Wanda and all them. I don’t have any superpowers or high-tech, government funded equipment.”

Natasha sniffed. “That bow of yours is actually pretty fancy, Clint. You should check it out sometime.”

 

“Shut up.”  
“Seriously, Clint. I can’t see the future quite the way Emily could, but I know that in a world like ours, people like you are always needed. You don’t have to be an Avenger to go   
out and make a difference. Emily wasn’t one. Even though I’m pretty sure she had more crap to avenge than the rest of us put together.”

“Darn right. At least somebody had some sense to stay out of this insanity.”

“Well, from the sound of things, she got right back into her own insanity. Just...there’s lots of different ways, that people...do stuff.” She gave him an encouraging smile. Clint returned the smile weakly.

“Emily was more than family to me, she was someone in my family who knew how it felt.”

“I know.”

“I wonder if Force Ghosts can visit this planet?”

“Clint, Emily wouldn’t have wanted this.”

“Yeah, I know. Don’t mourn for the people you love. Let go of your grief. Jedi bullcrap.”

“I’m sure that’s the Jedi bullcrap that Emily was trying to fix.”

Clint rested his glass on the table.

“Can I get you anything?”

“More beer. Please. Anything helps.”

 

Wanda was tired when she went to bed, but took forever to fall asleep. At two in the morning she was still tossing and turning, and Natasha still hadn’t come home. She finally drifted off into an uneasy sleep to the background noise of water dripping down the gutters as it began to snow heavily outside.

She woke the next morning to an unusual weight on her legs. She looked up to one side and saw Lila sitting on top of her.

“Wake up, Auntie Wanda! You said we’d build another snowman today!”

Wanda groaned.

“Auntie Wanda, I know you’re awake!” 

“Please, Lila.”

“Come on!” She grabbed Wanda’s arm and tried to pull her up.

“Where is your Auntie Nat? Why don’t you bother her?”

“Auntie Nat says you need to come downstairs for breakfast or it’ll be all gone!”

Wanda groaned again. “Give me a minute.” 

Lila scrambled off the side of the bed. Wanda laid down on her back, trying to feel awake but not wanting to get out of bed. 

“Hurry up!” said Lila, jumping on the floor.

Wanda laughed quietly. “Okay.” She sat up. Lila clapped for joy and ran out of the room. Wanda pulled the bed covers off herself and got up to follow Lila downstairs. Laura had made cinnamon blueberry muffins for breakfast. Cooper and Natasha were at the table eating while Laura was spooning baby food for Nathaniel.

“Where is Clint?” Wanda asked.

“He’s in the barn, sleeping,” said Natasha. “He got himself plastered.”

“Over Emily?”

Laura was trying to focus on feeding the baby.

“Clint actually has a lot of issues,” said Natasha. “There wasn’t enough alcohol in the whole bar to drown them out, apparently. And that reminds me, I was going to take him a few of these.” She pulled four muffins out of the pan and set them on a small plate. 

Not long after finishing breakfast Wanda went outside with Lila. They were both singing “Do You Wanna Build A Snowman?” from Frozen as they stepped outside. The porch steps and all of their tracks from the previous day were covered in a new layer of snow. Come to think of it, Wanda realized, “Do You Wanna Build A Snowman?” was actually a sad song.  
Natasha took the plate of muffins to the barn with a glass of milk and then went to join Lila and Wanda. They dusted off their snowman they had built yesterday. Then they scooped up some snow to start building another snowman right next to him, not quite as tall and maybe a little wider. When that was finished, they decided to build a third snowman--or a snow-droid, rather. Lila was so enamored of BB-8 in The Force Awakens that she wanted to recreate him as a snow sculpture. The round ball on the bottom was easy. Making the dome on the top was a little more tricky. They couldn’t get it to stand up on its own, so they settled for sculpting it onto the base. They added some spirals and knobs to decorate him. He looked very cute. That inspired Lila to want to change their other two snowmen to look a little like Finn and Rey. It gave Natasha and Wanda something to laugh about. 

Laura came out to the porch to call them in for lunch. She’d made hot tuna sandwiches. Clint finally put on an appearance, looking pouchy-eyed and unshaven. His older children hugged him but kept their distance. Wanda guessed that this wasn’t a regular occurrence but it had happened before. Clint ate his sandwich quickly and then went upstairs to shower and clean up. 

Cooper had been inside playing video games all morning. Clint decided that he’d done enough gaming and told him to go outside. In fact, he suggested that everyone go with them outside for a walk in the woods nearby. So Wanda and Natasha bundled up again, and Laura put baby Nate in his snowsuit. 

The snow was nearly three feet deep in some places out in the woods beyond the fallow pasture. Clint lead the way, trailblazing for his happy family so they wouldn’t have to wade through the worst parts of it. 

Natasha and Wanda fell to the back of the group.

“So when did you get in last night?” Wanda asked.

“Four A.M. We left the bar at three but with the snowstorm it took us a while to get home.”

“And you just put him in the barn?”

“Laura doesn’t like to sleep with him when he’s drunk.”

“I see.”

They talked quietly off and on for the remainder of the walk. Most of the time Wanda was walking with the children or by herself, admiring the stillness of the snowbound forest. Natasha would walk ahead to joke with Cooper and Lila or to chat with Laura or even to check on Clint.

After about an hour and a half walking, Clint headed the family back towards the farmhouse. Clint had a mind to go back to the barn and tinker with the tractor some more: he was trying to get a new part installed. They came out of the woods into the pasture when they saw it: something white against the faded red paint of the barn, perched on an unused piece of farm equipment parked just outside the door.

“Whoa, what’s that?” said Cooper.

“It’s some kind of a bird, I think,” said Laura, covering her eyes to look more closely.

“It’s an owl,” Clint said. “Maybe a barn owl, but I don’t recall them being that white.”

“Hedwig?” Wanda had stopped at the edge of the trees to make out the shape, but she recognized Hedwig’s mind from even that distance, hundreds of yards away. She started to run through the snow.

“Hedwig? Are you serious?” said Cooper, starting to follow Wanda.

“It’s Hedwig! It’s Hedwig!” Lila took off running after them. Laura and Natasha and Clint came after them.

“Seriously?” said Clint.

“We’ve seen weirder crap, Barton,” Natasha sighed.

“Kids, be careful!” shouted Laura. “Is the owl safe around children?”

“Of course she is,” said Natasha.

Baby Nate blew some spit bubbles.

“Do you see the owl, Nate? Can you see the owl?” Laura crooned to her son, pointing towards the barn.

Wanda had started to run and was the first to reach the barn. She was surprised that Hedwig hadn’t been startled away by their approach. She was surprised to see Hedwig at all, in fact.

She walked up to Hedwig cautiously. Hedwig was preening her wing.

“Hedwig, what are you doing here?” asked Wanda. “I thought Coulson sent you away for a while?”

Hedwig looked up at the sound of Wanda’s voice. The owl told her telepathically that she was still searching for Steve’s friend. She was just stopping to rest briefly.

Cooper and Lila caught up with her. 

“Wow, she’s so beautiful!” said Lila.

“Is that really Hedwig?” said Cooper, his mouth hanging open.

“Yes, it is.”

“Can we touch her?”

Wanda glanced up at Hedwig. Hedwig nodded at her. “Yes, I think she’ll let you.” Wanda held out her arm and Hedwig flew over to her. Cooper and Lila backed away, both of them gasping. Wanda held out her arm with Hedwig on it, Hedwig eyeing the children. “Just touch her back, pet her gently.”

Lila had the biggest grin on her face as she held out her little hand to stroke Hedwig’s back. Cooper looked like he was going to cry. 

“I take it you’ve got this under control, Wanda?” said Clint as he and Laura and Natasha approached.

“Yes. She responds to me,” said Wanda. 

Nate made a cooing sound and pointed at the owl.

“Yes, that’s an owl,” said Laura. “Isn’t she pretty?”

Hedwig chirped at the children. Cooper let his hand down, satisfied that he’d met a lifelong idol. But Lila looked like she wanted to stroke her all day.

“Can we keep Hedwig here for Christmas?” asked Lila.

“I’m afraid not,” said Wanda. “Director Coulson sent Hedwig on a special errand for Christmas. She’s just stopping here to rest.”

Lila noticed her father standing behind her. “Daddy, do you want to see the owl?”

“Sure,” said Clint noncommittally. Wanda stood up straight so that Hedwig was eye level with Clint. “Can I pet her?” 

“Sure, just be gentle.”

Hedwig hooted at him again.

“She’s very nice,” said Clint.

Wanda smiled. “I’m glad you like her.” Laura made as if to come closer with the baby, but Wanda told her to stay back. Hedwig looked at Wanda and hooted.

“Of course. Hedwig, this is Clint Barton. You may have heard of him. He is a very dear friend of mine, and he’s one of the Avengers.”

Clint sniffed. “Used to be.”

“Oh, you’re an Avenger to me,” said Laura. “Don’t say that.”

“Same here,” said Natasha. Hedwig swiveled her head to look at her. “Hello, Hedwig.”

Clint smirked at Hedwig. “Nice to meet you too, I guess.” Clint took the baby from Laura. “Now, this is Nathaniel. Don’t bite his fingers.”

Hedwig leaned her head forward for a closer look at a baby. Nate poked his fingers in the feathers around her face. Hedwig backed away and cocked her head to one side. Nate giggled and smiled at her.

Wanda held out Hedwig so Laura and Natasha could pet her. “I think it is time for Hedwig to go now,” said Wanda. 

“Oh,” said Lila sadly. “Can I give her a good-bye hug?”

“Since when do owls get hugs?” asked Clint.

“This one hugs,” said Wanda. She bent Hedwig down again. Lila wrapped her arms gently around Hedwig. Hedwig sort of nestled her head onto Lila’s shoulder. Laura and Natasha “awww”ed appreciatively. Then Wanda walked away from the group. “All right, Hedwig,” she said quietly. “Take care of yourself.” She was holding Hedwig close to her face. Hedwig leaned over and nibbled Wanda’s ear. Wanda giggled and then held out her arm. 

“Goodbye Hedwig!” shouted Lila.

Hedwig hooted and launched herself off of Wanda’s hand, soaring into the gray afternoon sky.

The family and their guests returned into the house after that. 

“That reminds me, I need to be reading the Harry Potter books,” said Wanda. 

“We have a set of hardcovers,” said Laura. “Bookcase in the living room.” 

“Thank you,” said Wanda. 

They shook the snow off their boots before going inside, and then they stripped out of their snow gear. Wanda decided she would get reading right away and went to the living room to pull Order of the Phoenix off the shelf. 

“And it’ll be nice to focus on some Harry Potter for a change,” Wanda said to Natasha. “I’ve had enough Star Wars for a little while.”

“No kidding.”

Clint simply groaned and sat down at the kitchen table.

“Can I get you anything, honey?” asked Laura.

“Just some coffee.”

Laura promised the children that if they helped her with dinner they would make Christmas cookies afterwards. So Lila and Cooper set the table while she and Natasha made spaghetti sauce and garlic bread. Wanda was in charge of cooking the pasta. Twice the water nearly boiled over and she had to wipe up a spill of hot foam. She didn’t dare use her powers to regulate the stove, however, lest she damage the equipment. Nobody talked much during dinner. Lila hoped that Hedwig would come back to visit them again. Clint was fuming at how a Jedi and now Harry Potter’s pet owl had invaded his life. Laura touched his hand sympathetically. To her, Emily had been a relative who’d made their lives a little brighter for a short time, someone who’d played with the children and gotten along with Clint. She didn’t miss her the way Clint did, but she was still sad that she was gone. 

Everyone pitched in to clean up the dishes except for Laura, who cleaned up Nate and then put him down for a nap. Then Laura started to make dough for sugar cookies, with Natasha and Wanda fetching her the ingredients. Clint and Cooper and Lila got out the white cake frosting and started mixing it with food coloring. Laura let her children lick the beaters and cut up the dough into shapes. The other grown-ups snatched pinches of cookie dough from the bowl when she wasn’t looking. Finally the cookies were out and cool enough for icing. Laura got out the special bags and nozzles so they could add details with the icing.

“These were my Christmas gift to her last year,” said Natasha as she drew a smiley face on one of the gingerbread-man shaped cookies. 

“That was thoughtful,” said Wanda. 

“So if tomorrow is Christmas Eve, then you know what today is?” said Cooper.

“What?” asked Laura.

“It’s Christmas Adam.”

Wanda hadn’t heard that joke before and laughed heartily.

“Not it’s not,” said Lila. “Today’s not a holiday at all.”

“Oh, it’s probably a holiday somewhere in the world,” said Clint. 

They decorated at least three dozen cookies, and by the time they were done their hands were sore from squeezing and spreading. They had also eaten quite a few of the plain   
and broken ones, but Lila and Cooper still shoveled away the ones they had just decorated. Natasha and Clint had decorated a group of round cookies to look like their Avengers friends, much to the entertainment of the children. Laura set out a group of six cookies on a plate and covered them with saran wrap. She told the children they were for Santa Claus, but of course Wanda and Natasha knew what that meant. Wanda took a small platter of three cookies with her to the living room and ate them while she was reading Harry Potter. It had gotten to the point where Wanda couldn’t put it down, it was so interesting. After she got ready for bed, she took Order of the Phoenix with her upstairs to read, turning off the main light and reading with the bedside lamp on.

“Do you know how much longer you’re going to be awake reading?” Natasha asked when she climbed into their bed.

“It depends,” Wanda replied, not looking up.

“What part are you on?” 

“It’s the chapter where they’re taking their O.W.L.’s.,” said Wanda.

Natasha sighed. “You’re going to be out of commission all night, honey.”

“Do you want me to go downstairs?” Wanda asked, turning.

Natasha laid down on her pillow, facing away. “Just don’t make any weird noises.”

Wanda smirked and continued reading. And of course Natasha had been correct: that chapter marked the beginning of the climax of the book. Wanda finished at about one in the morning, heartbroken and overwhelmed by the ending. But she managed to keep quiet.

 

The next day, Clint set up his archery targets outside the barn and got out his bow and arrows to practice. Wanda went out to watch him. He hit the bullseye every time and started to hit other parts of the targets on purpose.

“I’m a little rusty,” Clint mumbled to himself.

“Rusty?” Wanda said as Clint pulled the arrows out of his targets. “To anyone else you’d be doing amazing. You hardly lost your touch.”

She and Clint walked back to the firing line. “How often do you practice, anyway?”

Clint groaned. “Twice a week. Not often enough really.”

Wanda sniffed. “Natasha is right. You are getting restless.”

“Restless, me, who said anything about me getting restless?” Clint turned around and fired an arrow, pinning one of the knotholes on the side of the barn. 

“Laura senses it too.”

“Naw, I’m doing fine,” said Clint, shrugging. Wanda watched him while he let off a few arrows.

“Is this how you take out your anxiety?”

“More or less. I just like to shoot things.” 

“Do you ever try anything more complicated, like setting up an obstacle course or going out to the woods?”

“Once in a while,” said Clint. “I like to stay close to the house, though.”

“You know, it won’t kill you to leave Laura and the kids for a few days to go get some more practice, get back to the level where you were at.”

“Where’d I go?”

Wanda shrugged. “You could go anywhere.” 

 

After his archery session, Clint put away his equipment in the barn. He was just hanging up his bow when he heard someone moving in the snow by the door. He looked up and saw Lila.

“Hey, kid,” he said.

“Hi, Daddy,” said Lila quietly. “What are you doing?”

“I’m just finishing up a shooting session. I was gonna work on the tractor for a bit. Where’s Cooper?”

“He’s inside playing video games.”

“Well, you’re welcome to stay and watch, if you like,” said Clint, removing his jacket and rolling up his sleeves. He got a wrench and opened up the side of the tractor to pull out some screws near the engine.

“Daddy?” 

“Uh-huh?”

“When is Captain America going to come visit so we can sled on his shield?”

Clint snorted and looked at his daughter. “Lila, don’t be silly. You don’t really want him to, do you?”

“Yes, I do. I thought you and Captain America were friends.” She held her hands together in front of her chest innocently. 

“We’re not. The Avengers aren’t my friends, Lila. They’re just people I work with.” Clint went back to undoing screws with his wrench.

“But what about Auntie Nat? And Wanda?”

Clint pulled his hand and his wrench, wiping them on his shirt. “Well...Auntie Nat happens to be your Auntie. And Wanda is part of this family, too. But the people they work with...they’re not. It was just one time. I’m sorry if you got the wrong impression.”

Lila looked at her dad sideways. “Is there a difference between being friends and being family?”

“Lila, sweetie,” said Clint, kneeling down to look her in the eye. “There’s just some people that Daddy doesn’t like.”

“But why do you work with the Avengers, if you don’t like them?”

Clint smiled. He put his hand on Lila’s shoulder. “I think it’s because they like having me.”

 

Off and on all day, Natasha and Wanda were in the kitchen with Laura, cooking dishes for their Christmas Dinner the next day and baking pies and cakes. Natasha made her pumpkin roll again. That night for dinner they had leftover spaghetti. At bedtime the children got out their special flannel Christmas pajamas, and Clint read aloud “The Night Before Christmas” in the living room. And then the Bartons carried out their tradition of Christmas Eve S’mores, cooked over the fire.

“Have you had s’mores before, Wanda?” asked Clint, roasting his marshmallow on one of his old arrows.

“I haven’t, actually,” said Wanda.

Natasha shook her head. “I kept saying we were going to do some with you this summer.”

“I know,” said Wanda. “We just got busy.”

Wanda burned her first two marshmallows. Cooper ate them, because he didn’t mind the burned ones. But for the third marshmallow, Wanda used her powers to keep the marshmallow from igniting, creating a heat shield with one hand while holding the roasting stick in the other. It came out tanned to perfection but was nearly melting off the stick. Natasha caught her marshmallow on a plate and wedged it between two graham crackers and and a piece of chocolate. It was perfect. Wanda wanted to make herself another one right away, but Lila wanted Wanda to do the heat-shield trick for her first so she wouldn’t burn her marshmallow. Laura also made hot chocolate, and everyone had a cup before going to bed.

After Lila and Cooper were in bed, Natasha helped Clint and Laura to set up their Christmas gifts in the living room for the next morning. Wanda had opted to stay upstairs so she could be surprised for Christmas like they were. 

After two years in Strucker’s laboratories, she hadn’t really set any expectations for Christmas. This had been a perfect Christmas Eve night, but as she fell asleep she couldn’t help thinking that there was something missing...

 

“Wanda….Wanda….” 

A gentle voice was calling her name. Wanda thought for a moment it could be Natasha or Laura. She turned over in bed. Natasha was fast asleep, breathing quietly. Feeling for the other minds in the house, she sensed no one else awake. But there was a presence in the room, not mortal but spirit, and as Wanda’s eyes adjusted to the darkness they saw a growing light from one of the corners. She sat up in bed slowly as the personage took shape. 

It was a female spirit, dressed in a silvery gown with gold embroidery, and she wore a crown or a halo of light on the top of her head, but as Wanda’s eyes adjusted she noticed the light taking a shape of a wreath of candles. She had white hair pulled back in a low ponytail. There was something striking about the face. It was not too round or too long, the eyes and nose and lips were perfectly formed. She was very beautiful, but Wanda couldn’t help squinting at her, not because of the light but because the face looked so familiar. Where had she seen it before?

“Who are you?” asked Wanda.

“I am the Ghost of Christmas Past.” The Ghost smiled at her benevolently. “I have come to give you a gift.”

“What gift?” asked Wanda.

“Your memories of Christmas,” said the Ghost. “Come with me, and I will show them to you.”

“My memory is perfectly fine,” said Wanda. “What makes you think I need to see them--”

“Come.”

“All right.” Wanda pulled the covers off the bed and put on her red bathrobe. The wooden floor was cold, but as she got closer to the spirit she began to feel warm.

The Ghost held out a slender hand. Wanda took it with her own. The Ghost’s hand had a definite shape, but it was not solid. It was like grabbing onto a cloud. The hand was warm, almost hot, and as soon as Wanda had touched it the light grew brighter until it enveloped her. And then it almost immediately faded away.

 

They were in the middle of a cobblestoned street of a city. The buildings were faded and run-down and the lights around were a dull yellow. A few people were out and about, walking alone or in twos and threes on the sidewalks. Even though Wanda thought this was some kind of a dream she could still feel the biting cold. The sky above was a murky brown from the lights reflecting on the clouds, and odd snowflakes drifted through the air. It took her a minute to get her bearings, but once she recognized a few of the buildings she realized where they were.

“This is Sokovia,” she said.

“It is indeed.”

“But...there aren’t a lot of ruins around here. We have gone back in time, haven’t we? To before the war?”

“Yes, we have,” said the Ghost. “In fact, this is the year before the war. Now follow me.”

The year before the war...Off the top of her head, Wanda couldn’t remember many details from that time. But, this was her memory. She supposed she would let the spirit show her.

They walked down the street, walking at an angle towards the sidewalk on the right side of the street. The Ghost hitched up her skirt daintily to step over the gutter. Less gracefully, Wanda picked up the hem of her bathrobe. The sidewalk ran directly past some very tall, ugly buildings but was mostly in shadow, except for the alleys between them with their yellow streetlamps. 

Wanda looked out at the street and thought of how a year later it would be unrecognizable after the bombings.

“This way,” the Ghost called to her. She had gone a few yards ahead. Wanda hurried to catch up with her. But the Ghost was standing still in a pool of yellow light, watching someone coming down the sidewalk. It was a man with a bony face and a long nose. He had dark, curly hair and wore a dark jacket. In his arms he was carrying a small pine tree and a grocery bag filled with small toys.

“Is that--?” Wanda gasped.

“Yes it is,” said the Ghost. 

“Papa,” Wanda breathed. Mr. Maximoff continued down the sidewalk. This was a memory: he could neither see them nor hear them. Wanda had almost forgotten what his face looked like, how tall he’d been. She almost felt like crying. 

The Ghost watched him continue down the sidewalk, then she turned to Wanda and said, “We will take a different way.” The Ghost followed Wanda’s father for about a block, but then they turned down an alleyway and went up a fire escape that lined the side of a building. Wanda remembered that fire escape, how it had jangled loudly every time someone walked on it, but she and the Ghost made no noise as they ascended to the third floor. They walked through the back door without even opening it and then in a similar manner glided into a small apartment.

In the kitchen, a dark-haired woman and her dark-haired little girl were clearing off the table. Several dishes were cooking on the stove and there was something in the oven.

“Mama,” the girl asked, “if we don’t believe in God then why are we celebrating Christmas?”

Mrs. Maximoff smiled. “Wanda, your papa and I think Christmas is a good time to show you and Pietro how much we love you.”

“Well, shouldn’t you show us that every day?”

Her mother knelt down in front of her. “Of course we do.” She put a hand on little Wanda’s shoulder. “Come, let us put the tablecloth on.” Mrs. Maximoff picked up the folded tablecloth and started to unfold it. Wanda’s younger self grabbed the other end and helped her mother to drape it over the table. She had always liked the color red, even as a young girl, and tonight she wore a red wool dress over a pair of tattered black stockings and a shiny pair of shoes. Little Wanda wore her hair down, but her mother had hers in a bun behind her head, and she wore a loose apron over a stained skirt and faded shirt. 

A dark-haired, skinny boy wearing threadbare clothes came into the kitchen. “Mama, when is Papa going to be back?”

“Papa should be here any moment,” his mother replied. “Can you help--” The door opened. 

Little Wanda and Pietro shouted, “Papa!” and ran to the door to greet their father. He put the little tree and bag of presents down and then picked up his son and daughter in his arms and kissed them. Then he put them down.

“Please help your mother set the table, now, children,” said Mr. Maximoff. “I’ll set up the Christmas tree.”

“I want to help you put up the tree!” said Pietro.

“All right, you can help.”

“No, Papa! I can’t set the table by myself!” said Wanda.

“Wanda, I will help you,” said Mrs. Maximoff. The two ladies returned to the kitchen while Pietro and his father set up the little tree. They set it in a medium-sized pot and wrapped the base with newspapers. It was a light green color and its tiny branches were close together.

“Papa, how many Dolarez did it cost you to buy this tree?” asked Pietro.

“Twenty-five,” said Mr. Maximoff. “It was still too much.”

“At that price? It was a bargain!” said Mrs. Maximoff from the kitchen. Wanda put the cutlery on the table while her mother stirred the food on the stove. Pietro and his father decorated the little Christmas tree with a cheap tinsel garland and a paper star. Mr. Maximoff wrapped the bags of presents in their plastic sacks a little more tightly and hid them under the table as his wife called for them to come and eat.

The adult Wanda watching this scene with the Ghost of Christmas Past was astonished. There had been a time when the Maximoffs had been not just the twins but a whole family. The four of them sat down around the little table and ate a roasted chicken and buttered bread and a rich vegetable and lentil soup and milk to drink. Mr. Maximoff started grumbling about his job at the factory but his wife chided him. 

“It is Christmas, darling, let us be happy,” she said. She asked Wanda and Pietro about the games they had gone out and played with the neighborhood children during the day. Wanda made a few comments but mostly focused on eating. Pietro chattered loudly about his foot races and wrestling matches with the neighborhood boys and about how their gang of friends had climbed over the fence to the police station parking lot to look at the police cars. Mrs. Maximoff tried to tell him not to play so roughly in the future, but she couldn’t but help laugh at his stories and the way he told them. She finally told Pietro to eat his soup and started to converse with her husband to give their son a chance to eat. 

Wanda put down her fork and knife. “I am finished eating,” she said.

“Well, you will have to wait for Pietro to catch up,” said her father. “You aren’t getting any Christmas presents until everyone has eaten their dinner.”

Pietro started wolfing down huge bites of his food. 

“Pietro, please eat quietly,” said Mrs. Maximoff.

“Sorry,” he muttered between mouthfuls. And then he burped. Wanda tried to cover her mouth but she couldn’t keep from rocking back and forth in mirth. 

“Pietro, what do we say?” 

He swallowed. “Excuse me.”

Pietro and her parents finally finished their food. Everyone helped to take the dishes to the sink--the tiny apartment didn’t even have a dishwasher--but they left them there to wash later. The children followed their parents gleefully to the living room. Mr. Maximoff pulled out the grocery sacks of presents from under the table. He pushed one across the faded rug towards Pietro.

“Here you go. Merry Christmas,” he said. 

Pietro pulled out two little plastic boxes, one of them had a matchbox car in it, the other had a model airplane. “Cool!” he shouted.

Mr. Maximoff rummaged through the second plastic bag and pulled out something small, but he handed the rest to Wanda. Little Wanda’s eyes grew wide when she pulled out a plastic doll wearing a pink dress. Her mother bent down to help her take out the packaging. 

The grown-up Wanda furrowed her eyes. It was the kind of cheap plastic doll that was sold in dollar stores in the States. Lila Barton would never have touched that kind of doll.   
But Wanda’s younger self had thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world. Once the doll was unpackaged she went through the rest of the bag. There was a children’s chapter book inside, and young Wanda flipped through the pages eagerly, taking in the scent of ink on fresh paper. And at the bottom of the bag was a shirt and skirt set. She jumped up excitedly when she saw these and held them up to her body. 

“It’s so pretty!” she said. “I have something pretty to wear to school!”

Pietro had also received a new jacket, navy blue with white stripes down the sleeves and a popular sports brand on the front. He put it on and displayed it proudly. Both of the children ran to their parents and thanked them, hugging their legs.

“Oh, and I almost forgot,” said Mr. Maximoff, “I had something for you.” He turned to his wife and held up a pretty gold necklace with a heart charm.

Mrs. Maximoff gasped. “Darling, it is so beautiful. Oh, thank you.” Wanda and Pietro’s parents kissed tenderly.

“All right, children, one more present for all of us,” said Mr. Maximoff. He reached under the tree table again and pulled out a cardboard box of soda cans. Wanda gasped.

“Real soda pop! Yes!” shouted Pietro. Mr. Maximoff opened the box while Pietro hovered over him impatiently. He handed the first can to Pietro, who pulled back the tab immediately for a swig. Pietro also took the second can as it was passed out and gave it to Wanda. She held it in one hand while holding her new doll and book in the other.

“Merry Christmas, my darlings,” said Mrs. Maximoff. 

Wanda looked up at her mother and smiled: she hadn’t been on board with the whole idea of Christmas at first, but it had turned out to be something special. “Merry Christmas, Mama.” Wanda leaned over and hugged her mother. Pietro, finishing his can of soda, also leaned over to hug his mother, and their father joined in as well.

 

“It is so sweet,” the adult Wanda said to the Ghost. “We had so little--and yet we loved each other so much.” She watched the family get up to put their presents away. Pietro had another can of soda. 

The Ghost smiled at her. “Yes. You and Pietro were not yet so burdened by all of the evil in the world. That is when Christmas is truly magical: when it can be appreciated for its wonder and beauty, as through the eyes of a child. Come. It is time to visit another of your Christmas memories.”

Wanda’s face fell. “No! Why must we leave? I want to stay here--forever. Why can’t I be with my family again, just for once?”

The Ghost looked at her sadly, and for a moment Wanda thought she recognized the look on her face. “Your family is with you, Wanda. Always. You know this.”

Wanda knew the Ghost spoke the truth, but she turned back to the living room scene to watch Pietro running around with his new toys, energized by the sugar and caffeine in the soda. 

“I do.”

“And you do know, as you learned later in your childhood, that there is a time to let go--a time for moving on.” The Ghost looked at Wanda, not smiling but encouraging her. 

Wanda reached out to take the spirit’s hand. And the Ghost took it. A warm, golden light filled the apartment where they had been, and the scene faded away. They were once again on a street in Sokovia City, but the surroundings were much changed from before. Buildings had been blasted and broken apart, some of them reduced to heaps of rubble. In what light there was from the few remaining streetlamps the ruins looked ghastly and skeletal. The parts of the street that weren’t covered in rubble were either cracked or already broken. The pavement and sidewalks had been crudely patched in places. Only two buildings on the street had scaffolding on them for repairs, and one of them was covered with plastic that shuddered rather than fluttered in the icy wind. Wanda couldn’t help but thinking of the similar destruction that she had seen in the battle with Ultron.

The street where Wanda and the Ghost stood ran down to an intersection where the road split into two. On the city block where the intersection formed was the only open business on that street. Rare enough for Eastern Europe, it was a candy shop. The big display window and the smaller window on the door were both still taped in case of future bombings. The only person inside the store was the clerk, whom she could see through the window, a tall, bald man with a slightly stooped back who wore all black. And there were no people outside the store on the street at all--or at least Wanda thought there were none, until she heard someone talking.

“I want to go home, Pietro. It’s cold out.” It was her younger self, hiding behind a safety barrier with her brother. 

Pietro was peeking out from behind the barricade to look at the candy shop. “Auntie’s going to be gone all night working and we can’t fix the heater ourselves. It’s actually much colder out there than it is here.”

Young Wanda wrapped her arms around her shoulders and shivered. “But at least inside we’d be away from the wind.”

“But while we’re out here we can be having fun.” Pietro pulled her down next to her. The Maximoff twins had not grown much taller in the last year, but they were both thinner. Wanda was wearing an oversized sweater over a school skirt, but still had the same plastic dress shoes she had last year--from the way her older self could see her walking, however, they were pinching her feet. Pietro was wearing the jacket he had received as a present last year, but it was faded and torn in places. His dark hair was shaggy and kept falling into his eyes. His sister wore a headband to pull hers back.

“They might be closed, Pietro, even with the light on,” Wanda whispered urgently to her brother. 

“No, they’re not closed,” said Pietro. “They close it at seven, and it’s almost six-thirty.”

“It’s Christmas Eve!”

Pietro sniffed. “The old man doesn’t close on Christmas. That’s his best day for business anyway.” He looked up at his sister.

“Pietro, this is a bad idea!” Wanda insisted. “Stealing is wrong. You know that.”

“But I want to get you something.”

“I don’t want anything,” said Wanda, folding her arms. “And you’re going to grab something for yourself anyway.”

“Yeah, so what?” He stood up.

“Pietro,” she said, grabbing him by the arm. “If you get caught stealing, they will take you to jail.”

“I’m too young to go to jail.”

“The government doesn’t care. Stealing is stealing. You shouldn’t do it.”

“Wanda, I have to. Auntie has precious little money to afford presents for us, much less candy.”

Wanda glanced briefly at the ground. Then she looked at him, bending her lip and brow in resignation. “All right. How do you want to do it?”

Pietro started to step out from behind the barrier. “Just follow my lead.” He began to walk down the street.

“Follow your lead? But Pietro, don’t you have a plan?”

Pietro turned around to look at his sister. “Wanda, just relax. Improvising is what I do best. Let’s get over there.”

“Wait for me!” Wanda took off at a run and grabbed his hand. They sprinted the rest of the way down the street, Pietro pulling her along and Wanda panting for breath. They did their best to stay in the shadows, away from the glare of the streetlamps. They paused behind a fallen metal strut.

“Are you okay?” asked Pietro. “Do you need to rest?”

Wanda caught her breath quickly. “No, I’m fine. Let’s get over there.” The twins grabbed hands and continued running. They ran to the edge of the building that the candy shop was in and then ducked low to crawl until they were under the shop window. They both sat up slowly. Wanda had her eyes over the display to look at the man standing behind the counter. 

“He’s writing in his ledger,” said Wanda. “Do you think we--what is it, Pietro?” he was tugging on her sleeve.

“Look,” he said, pointing to the sweets on display in the window. Wanda bent down for a closer look. Both of the children’s eyes were wide with wonder. The display was filled with all sorts of sweets--chocolates of every shape and size, pyramids of fudge in different varieties, artistically-dipped pretzels, open boxes of gourmet candies, bowls of wrapped bonbons and butterscotch, cups full of lollipops and licorice. Even in the difficult economy, the little candy shop was doing well. 

Wanda shrank away from the window with a sigh. “Pietro, this is wrong. We can’t do this.”

“Don’t chicken out on me now, Wanda,” Pietro said. “I need your help.”

“Then how are we going to do this?” 

Pietro leaned up to look at the man at the counter. “I need you to distract him. You go inside. Tell him you have a lost, erm, kitten.”

“Kitten? Pietro, that’s lying! Lying so we can steal? We could be in so much trouble.”

“Just do as I say, Wanda. It’ll be worth it! So you go in and tell him you need help. You keep him talking, make sure he pays attention to you. I’ll browse around and look innocent, and while you’re talking to him I’ll get behind the counter and take whatever I can grab.”

“What? He’ll stop you!”

“No he won’t. I’ll be faster.”

“Why not just grab something from the shelves?”

“That’s what he’ll be expecting.”

“Pietro, even if we get in there before he figures out what we’re up to--” 

“He won’t. He’s probably a nice, sentimental old man who’ll feel sorry for two cold, hungry orphans.”

“In that case wouldn’t it be easier to just ask nicely?”

Pietro snorted. “No, because nobody shares in this stupid country--even if they are nice. Are you ready?”

Wanda stood up. “Let’s do this.” Pietro stood up as well. Wanda opened the door and walked in first. The bell over the door rang. The man at the counter looked up. He was not, as Pietro had described, a nice, sentimental old man, but a permanently frowning clerk who showed no sign of softening at the sight of two children. Young Wanda looked up at him timidly as she walked up to the counter. Then she put her hands and her chin up on top on front of the man.

“If you please, sir,” she began.

“What can I help you with?” he asked, looking down at his ledger again.

“I would -- erm,” she looked at Pietro, and he nudged her. “I am looking for my kitten. Have you seen it? Please?”

The man was not convinced. Pietro started to wander off to Wanda’s right to examine the contents of the candy counter. 

“I haven’t seen any cats around here,” said the man. “I’ve been in the shop all day.”

“Well--is there anyone else around here, who may have seen him?”

Pietro was walking away from the counter, feigning interest in the selection of bagged candy displayed on the wall.

“No. The confectioners have gone home for the night. Can I get you anything?” The man stood up from his stool and leaned over the counter, looming over Wanda.

“No, n-n-no, sir.”

Pietro started to walk back towards the counter.

“Where are your parents?” the bald man asked.

“They are at work,” said Wanda feebly. “Mama is working overtime at the food plant. Papa has to drive a truck from Serbia. There’s a blizzard out there. They won’t be home for a long time.”

The man furrowed his brows more deeply. “It is a fair night tonight, minus the wind. I wasn’t aware of any storms in the area.” Wanda was wringing her hands. She glanced over   
at Pietro, who winked as he ducked behind the counter.

“But tell me about your kitten,” said the bald man, walking along the back of the counter to meet Wanda in the front. Wanda backed away when he emerged. He was at least twice as tall as she was. “What does it look like, what color is it?”

“She’s brown, with white spots. No, I mean white with brown spots, sir.” She stared up at the man like a deer in headlights.

“Really? I thought you said the cat was a ‘he.’”

“It-it-it is hard to tell, isn’t it?”  
Behind the counter, Pietro had picked the lock of one of the cabinet doors. He slid it open silently. What got the attention of the clerk was the noise of the wrappers as two of the   
big chocolate truffles inside them were removed.

Pietro only saw him glance up once, and he stuffed the truffles in his jacket pockets and sped out from behind the counter. He didn’t need to tell Wanda to run. She opened the door ahead of him as he put on a burst of speed to elude the long arms of the bald man. The bald man pursued him out the door, ignoring Wanda, and Wanda ducked into a back alley off the street they had come from. Pietro led the man on a chase over the broken street. The man slid on a patch of ice, yelled, and then tripped over a piece of rubble. Pietro turned the other direction and headed towards an alley parallel to the one where Wanda had ran and hidden. 

They rendezvoused on the far side of the block. Pietro waved her over to a side street, and they continued running until they reached an overhang formed by a slab of broken cement. Pietro went behind it last, checking their surroundings before he looked away from the street. 

Wanda was clutching her side. “That...was...stupid,” she panted. “There’s no way we should’ve gotten away from him.”

“Relax, Wanda. I remembered that patch of ice from when we were out there earlier. I figured it might come in handy.”

Wanda smirked. “You really were faster than him, then. So did you get anything?”

“Not much,” said Pietro, reaching into his pockets. “It’s a good thing it’s cold out, though. They’re not melted.” He pulled out the large, square truffles.

Wanda’s face widened into a grin. “Oh, those are my favorite. I remember Mama brought me one, once.”

Pietro gave one of the truffles to his sister. “Merry Christmas.” They ate their stolen treats contentedly.

But while the older Wanda and the Ghost of Christmas Past watched them, something was bothering her.

“What is it?” the Ghost asked. 

Wanda wanted to say that it was nothing. But then she said, “What he said before we broke in, ‘It’ll be worth it.’ That’s what he said to me when Strucker was starting his experiments on us.” 

The spirit placed a hand on Wanda’s shoulder--and oddly enough she felt something warm there. “Pietro meant it innocently then,” said the spirit. You had both suffered much hurt because of the war--the deaths of your parents and many of your friends and relatives. The lack of food and proper clothing. But neither of you were burdened by it yet. You were still young.”

They watched the two orphans eating their truffles. 

“A lot of children lost their parents in the war,” Wanda tried to say dismissively.

“Yes, but most of them, when they grew up, just carried the pain with them--many still do, to this day. But you and Pietro were different. You both wanted to do something about your loss, no matter how illegal it was. And as time passed and you both learned about the outside world that still buffeted Sokovia, you found someone to blame.”

“Stark,” Wanda breathed.

“I have one more memory to show you.” Wanda could guess by the Ghost’s expression that it was not a happy memory. She would have preferred to see more of her childhood. Wanda and the Ghost held hands and faded into the golden light once again. When they came out, they were standing outside of a church. The buildings around it were in much better repair than they had been in the aftermath of the war. 

Wanda looked at the Ghost and almost wanted to beg her to spare her the sight of this memory. But the spirit looked at her and shook her head. Wanda couldn’t shake off the feeling that she had seen the spirit’s face before somewhere but put the thought aside as they walked forward and passed through the doors of the church.

 

It was midnight on Christmas Eve, and the Saint Ursula Catholic Church was celebrating its annual Christmas Mass. The people in the congregation were holding up burning candles and singing a hymn, led by a priest in robes up front. Then the priest went to his lectern to read the Christmas story and the congregation sat down. 

Wanda and the Ghost walked up the central aisle. The Ghost was looking at two people sitting close together in one of the pews. Wanda looked with her. It was her and Pietro, both now in the full flower of adulthood. Pietro’s hair was still brown and he wore it evenly cut, and he was wearing a brown leather jacket over a hoodie. She wore her hair loose over a red shawl and a short black dress, rather like the clothes she would take to wearing after they had left Strucker’s castle. Pietro paid reverent attention to the reading and the sermon that followed. Wanda, however, tried to keep herself from falling asleep and setting something on fire with her candle. She stifled a loud yawn. Pietro smirked at her and patted her on the shoulder. Wanda looked as though she could have fallen asleep right then, but she kept herself awake. Before too long the congregation rose to their feet again. The priest led them in a prayer and in singing “Silent Night.” He pronounced a final blessing and the congregation said “Amen” and began talking. Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, however, left as soon as one of the priest’s assistants had opened the door. They said ‘Merry Christmas’ to him in passing and stepped out into the street. It was a cold, cloudy night, but there was neither snow nor wind. Wanda’s present self and the Ghost followed outside.

The twins walked away from the church down a sidewalk that went down a dark street.

“You know, you didn’t have to come with me.”

“Yes, well, I wanted to,” said Wanda. “And since it’s Christmas, I might as well.” 

Pietro laughed. “You’re half the reason I don’t go to church very much.”

“Well, why do you go at all? You’re only just less agnostic than I am.”

“For Papa.”

“For Papa,” Wanda repeated.

“Yes, he liked to go to that church, when he was a boy. Going there helps me feel close to him. But never as close as when I’m with you.” He grabbed her hand and squeezed it.

“I’m sure,” said Wanda. 

They both were quiet for a minute, each lost in their own thoughts.

“Pietro,” Wanda said. “Do you think Mama and Papa would be happy, if they saw where we were now, and how we were doing?”

“I think so,” said Pietro. “Just as long as we were happy.”

Wanda stopped walking. “That’s it.”

“What’s it?”

“I’m not happy,” she said, looking down at the sidewalk.

“Not happy? How can you be not happy?”

“Because of Sokovia’s foreign policy!”

Pietro sniffed. “That’s a stupid reason to not be happy.”

“It is not,” Wanda said, swiping her hand at him playfully. “It’s a perfectly valid reason. You know how things are. As long as we have corrupt men in our government who accept bribes from the Americans to keep us from building our own economy, we will never have enough to make us happy. Not enough jobs. Not enough clothes or food. Not enough of the basic necessities of life.”

“Straight out of Marina Karel’s speech at the rally last week.”

“It’s the truth. And it’s worse now than ever, because America and S.H.I.E.L.D. have the Avengers to make us do what they want,” said Wanda. She kicked a rock she saw on the sidewalk.

“I know that,” said Pietro. 

“They can make anyone do whatever America wants. It’s not fair.”

“No, it never is fair,” said Pietro. “American ideals corrupt everything they touch. And there’s not much we can do about it.”

“No, it has not been easy,” said Wanda. “You can’t control ideas. You can’t change the way people think.”

“No,” said Pietro. “But you can change the way people do things.” He sighed. “I’m sorry I had to drag you out here at midnight.”

“No, it’s okay,” said Wanda. “As long as I’m with you, I am safe. Besides, if you cannot get time off work to go to the sunrise service at Saint Peter’s, then we can go to midnight mass here. It’s all the same.”

“No, it’s not, I like the sunrise service. Saint Peter’s serves food.”

Wanda laughed. “Is that all you care about? Getting a free meal?”

“Do you care that I do?”

“No. In fact I like that they serve a meal for the poor for Christmas. But you’re just more worried about your own stomach.”

“Guilty as charged,” said Pietro.

“I wish more government organizations would do that--that they would actually do something to fix the problems in the world and help people. Instead of just talk about how to   
prevent more problems.”

“Or create super-soldiers and monsters to throw at them.”

“Exactly.” Wanda looked ahead of them as they walked, fuming privately. “I wish…”

“You wish what? What do you want?”

“It’s nothing,” said Wanda.

“No, tell me. I don’t care if it’s impossible.”

“You can’t get it for me.”

“Try me.”

Wanda shrugged. “I wish we could do something about the Avengers. Not just keep protesting or lobbying here in Sokovia. I want to confront them. I want to stop them.”

“And what is Wanda Maximoff of Sokovia going to do? Talk to them? Walk back and forth with her ‘Stop the Avengers’ sign in front of them?”

“Yes,” Wanda giggled. “No, really, I would like to stop them from what they are doing. I want to actually fight them.”

Pietro was silent. Wanda waited with a little trepidation for his response.

“You know what, Wanda,” said Pietro finally, “I’ve been feeling the same way lately.”

“You have?”

“Yes, I have. I have a lot of time to think, working at the factory. Mostly about how much I’d rather be working somewhere else. Rather be doing something else. Rather be with you.” He touched her cheek. “But yes, somebody has to stand up to the Avengers. Something has to be able to stop them. Something stronger.” 

“Someone stronger, yes. But you and me, Pietro? We’re both human. They’re...well, one of them is a god. Or seems to be a god. The others are powerful in their own ways, though. They have powers greater than anything we can comprehend. How do you expect to compete with that?”

Pietro shrugged. “Eh, I don’t worry about that. I just think that someone or something will come along...something that can fight them. And we can use it. Well?” 

Wanda shook her head. “It is not that simple. How do we become powerful enough to fight them without becoming the thing we’re trying to fight?”

Pietro raised an eyebrow. “Well, true, it’s not wise to fight fire with fire. But I can’t imagine that we’re the only people in the world who feel this way. And maybe some of those people are smarter than us. Maybe they’d know how to stop the Avengers. Exploit their weaknesses.”

“Make them realize that what they’re doing is wrong,” said Wanda, staring off into space. She looked up at Pietro. “Let’s do something about it,” she said.

“Do what?”

“Stop the Avengers. If anything comes along that could give us a chance to stop them--to stop Tony Stark in particular--if we find a way, we take the opportunity.”

“Is this a New Year’s resolution I’m hearing?”

“Well, it’s Christmas. Maybe it’s what I really want for Christmas--a gift you can’t get with money or working long hours or protesting.”

“But in the meantime you still want to go to the rallies of course, right?”

“Of course.” Wanda took her brother’s hand, and the twins set off into the night. 

 

Wanda’s present self watched her past self disappear into the dark beyond the last street. The Ghost of Christmas Past watched her, but waited for her to respond.

“And it was not many months after this night,” Wanda said, “that Baron Strucker’s men came to Sokovia. I joined the wrong side, deliberately. I made a mistake. I was so wrong--Pietro and I were both wrong. No--I convinced him.”

“You were deceived,” said the Ghost. “You did not know at the time that he belonged to Hydra.”

“It was still foolish for us to volunteer,” said Wanda. “We were so blinded by our own hatred and grief. And then Ultron came.”

“Yes, and he deceived you also,” said the Ghost. The other lights in the scene had gone out. They were standing in a cold void. “Wanda, I have shown you your past not because you need to accuse yourself, but because you need to forgive yourself. Forgiveness requires seeing the past clearly. You have since realized your mistake for joining Hydra, but you still blame yourself for what you did with the powers they gave you. The consequences of some of your choices were not entirely under your control. You know that by now.”

“Yes. Yes I do,” said Wanda. “But I can’t forgive myself. Because of me, Pietro is dead and I’m the only one left in my family.”

“Pietro’s death was not your fault,” said the Ghost. “How can I make it more clear to you? Neither of you were converted to Hydra’s ideology and you did not work to promote its evil cause. And you have since fought against them. And the moment you and Pietro discovered the truth of Ultron’s scheme, you did not hesitate to do what was right. You have now taken your place in the light. You have joined the fight, and for good or ill you cannot abandon it.”

Wanda could feel herself starting to cry. “But...Pietro and I didn’t volunteer for Strucker so we could join the Avengers. We volunteered because we wanted to fight them, to destroy everything that they stood for. And ever since the last battle in Sokovia I’ve been living like a queen with them, shopping and spoiling the Barton children...I live in America and I am everything I ever hated Americans for. I make more money in a week now for doing nothing than I did working for a year back in Sokovia.”

“Why must you be ashamed of the opportunities life has given you?” said the Ghost. “Pietro would have wanted you to have a better life, and you would not have found it in Sokovia. You’re not spending all of your income on frivolities, but you are having fun. You are happy. You have friends and a home and a place to belong--a new family, even. And you are making use of yourself and your powers: you are an Avenger. You fight do defend those less fortunate than yourself. You always have, just in different ways.”

Wanda considered the spirit’s words.

“Do you know,” said the Ghost, “what it means to be an Avenger?”

“No. Does it mean something?”

“It means that you fight for someone you love. It was true for the original team that was assembled by Nick Fury in New York. It is true for the team you work with now. Who do you fight for, Wanda?”

Wanda straightened herself now. “I fight for Pietro. I fight so that no one can ever be deceived the way we were, by Hydra or Ultron or anyone else. I fight for my parents’ memories. For my people in Sokovia. I fight so that everyone can have a better world to live in.”

“Not only that,” said the spirit, “but you fight for your new friends as well. You and Pietro won their hearts very soon after turning against Ultron, and you wanted to earn your place among them. And now, you fight with the Avengers because they have taken you in as one of their own. You fight to help them do what they think is right. The next spirit you meet will show you this and more: he will show you what you are fighting for.”

“The next spirit? Wait, no, you are leaving me?”

The Ghost of Christmas Past put her warm hand on Wanda’s chin and looked into her eyes. She smiled gently. 

“No, I don’t want you to go,” said Wanda. “I don’t feel...I don’t feel as alone with you.”

“Wanda,” said the spirit, pulling back her hand. “Always remember what you are fighting for, who you are and where you came from. Remember that, and you will be true to yourself.”

It was then that Wanda suddenly realized why the spirit was so familiar: she had the same face as the girl who had dated Bucky Barnes for two months in Albuquerque.

“Grace?” 

The spirit smiled and then vanished.

 

Wanda felt the cold wooden floor of her guest room at the Bartons’ house under her feet. She could see the outlines of familiar shapes in that room and hear Natasha’s breathing. She was back where she had been, in the present. And she was cold.

She sat down on the edge of her bed. A part of her felt like crawling back under the covers. She had felt like crying about a minute ago but the feeling had passed. Now she just felt miserable--alone and afraid, like she’d been after Vision had rescued her after Pietro’s death.

I’m right here.

The words came to her as a thought rather than an actual voice. Wanda felt her brother’s presence but did not see him. But that was enough. She began feeling warm again on the inside. It was like he was hugging her. But then she felt guilty and pulled herself away from that feeling.

Are you all right?

No, I’m not all right. Look what we did, Pietro. Look what we did to the world.

Wanda, it doesn’t matter now. It wasn’t our fault. We were both blinded by hate. We were both tricked. It’s okay. You are making things right now.

Wanda let go of her guilty thoughts. The warmth surged inside of her again. It wasn’t a feeling connected with her powers, it was something outside of her that was holding her. Comforting her. Loving her. She let herself enjoy that feeling for a few moments.

Now isn’t there someone else coming?

Wanda jumped up. Yes, yes there is.

Wanda went to the window. Pulling aside the curtain just slightly she looked outside at the driveway and the fields covered with snow. Certainly no one would be coming through that tonight--at least not someone flesh and blood.

But then she sensed another presence in the house, waiting for her downstairs. Either the next spirit had already come and was waiting for her or he--it was certainly a he--had appeared at that instant.

Wanda pulled away from the window. Trying to step as quietly as possible, she went down the stairs, clutching the rail to guide her in the dark. At the bottom of the stairs she could see that the tree lights and window lights were on, even though Clint turned them off every night. A huge fire had been built in the fireplace, and someone was sitting on the couch, helping himself to the milk and cookies that Lila and Cooper had left out for Santa Claus. Wanda wondered for a moment if it was Santa Claus. But it wasn’t, for Santa came down the chimney, and that would have been impossible with the fire going. 

The man’s figure was bathed in gentle light from the fire and the electric lights. Even sitting down, Wanda could tell he was very, very tall. He wore a long, green velvet robe trimmed with fur and a wreath of holly on his brow. As he ate the Christmas cookies from the plate he got crumbs and bits of icing stuck in his facial hair. 

“Aha!” he said, his voice booming loudly in the quiet house. “A Merry Christmas to you, Miss Maximoff!”

“Thank you, sir,” said Wanda nervously. “Who are you?”

“Why,” said the man, stuffing the last piece of cookie in his mouth, “I am the Ghost of Christmas Present!”

“Christmas Present?” Wanda asked, turning her head slightly. “As in Christmas right now?”

“Yes,” he said, nodding as he brushed his beard and mustache free of crumbs.

“What do you have to show me?”

“The Christmas spirit that is around you this year,” said the Ghost. “All we have to do is go looking for it.”

Wanda glanced behind her at the dark stairwell. 

“No, Miss Maximoff,” said the Ghost, “you won’t need any coats or boots when you’re with me. We travel fast and light and then we usually stay indoors. Now, come along.”

The Ghost stood up. He was indeed very tall, so tall that his head was inches from the ceiling. He began to walk towards the door. Wanda was about to follow him, but then she noticed that there was one remaining Christmas cookie on the plate. She grabbed it quickly and began to eat it as she went after the Ghost. The Ghost of Christmas Present opened the door for her. It was bitterly cold outside, but there was a full moon out that made the snow on the ground glisten. The Ghost waited politely for Wanda to finish her cookie. And then he instructed her to take his robe. She grabbed onto a fold of velvet in the sleeve. And then the Ghost rose into the air and dragged her along with him. She was screaming from the sudden burst of speed and the cold wind and the hair whipping in her face. In no time at all they were miles above the ground, at least the same altitude as an airplane would fly. Miles and miles of dark land passed below them as they traveled, until they came to a long, glittering strip of civilization that clumped together like an ocean, and they went to the largest lump that stuck out of it and flew downward, and Wanda realized that they were going towards New York City. 

They headed right into the thick of the tall buildings in lower Manhattan, soaring over the enormous patch of white that was Central Park. And before she knew it, they were swooping up towards Stark Tower, the A for Avengers still illuminated. They flew around it, Wanda holding on for dear life, but then landed gently on Stark’s landing platform.

“Have you missed this place?” the Ghost of Christmas Present asked her.

“No,” said Wanda hastily. She and the Ghost walked through the walls into the hangar and then went silently up the stairs to the lounge. And the more she looked around and heard the sounds of familiar laughter and voices echoing around, the more she realized that she did miss the place. Just a little. Was she supposed to feel bad, that she didn’t look back to her stay at Stark Tower more often?

 

But then she saw the people in the room. Many of them Wanda recognized from the Avengers staff or the higher-up offices of S.H.I.E.L.D.. There wasn’t more than twenty in the room. Tony Stark was in one corner, talking with Rhodey. Vision and Steve were conversing on the couches with Doctor Helen Cho. Nick Fury was talking to someone from S.H.I.E.L.D. that Wanda didn’t know, and Maria Hill and Eric Selvig were by the balcony.

“So yeah, Jane chose to stay in England for the time being,” said Selvig. “It’s closer to the rest of Europe, anyway, and she’s got an offer to do some research with another scientist.”

“Well that’s pretty cool,” Maria nodded. “I’m glad she’s enjoying herself.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” said Selvig, nodding as he took a sip of beer. “I think she misses Thor. She’s not saying anything, of course--”

“Yeah, strong female scientist isn’t allowed to have feelings for her project, I get it.”

“Thor was never her project.”

“In a way he was,” said Maria. 

Selvig rolled his eyes and had another drink.

“So where are Darcy and Ian? Are they still together?”

“Well, they broke up last year, but got back together a few months ago. They seem to be doing fine. Darcy managed to drag him across the pond to meet her family. She wants to get married but I don’t think he’s too keen.”

“Uh-huh.” Maria sipped her martini. “And what else are they doing?”

“He’s still working as a research assistant at Queen’s College. She was doing that last year but I think she wants to move on to something else.”

“Like what?”

Selvig shrugged. 

“Is she going to finish her Political Science degree?”

“I don’t think so.”

There was a sound of laughter across the room. It was Vision laughing at something Steve had said. “So how’s it working out with the android?”

“It’s going well,” said Maria. “His uber-politeness unnerves me sometimes. But that’s what manly chivalry does to me in general. You can never tell if the guy is flirting or being polite.”

“I think it’s safe to say with Vision that he’s being polite. You can tell when you watch him, he’s got some of Thor’s manners in him. And a lot of goodness, too. I don’t think if Thor had charged him with the hammer like he did--” Selvig broke off and shook his head.

“I get it, yeah. I dunno. He has the mind stone’s power. But if that thing is evil I don’t think it’s corrupting him.”

“We’d best hope for that.”

Vision got off the couch, excusing himself from Steve. He went to talk to Tony Stark and Rhodey. They both greeted him warmly, Rhodey giving him a pat on the back. Unseen and unheard, Wanda and the Ghost accompanying her walked up behind him. Rhodey was telling Stark about his adventures with Vision and the other Avengers. 

“Well, I’m glad you two are having fun,” said Tony coolly.

Vision shrugged. “‘Fun’ isn’t exactly the term I would use. It’s very stressful, sometimes, to watch the others put themselves in dangerous situations. I can withstand nearly anything, but the others are a good deal more vulnerable.”

“You get stressed out?” asked Tony, curious.

“Yes, well, the Colonel’s and Wilson’s suits can get them away from danger, but there’s always the worry that they won’t be fast enough.”

“Too right,” said Rhodey. “And there’ve been a few near misses.”

“And then Wanda and Natasha and Steven aren’t wearing very protective clothing at all. You recall when Natasha broke her back, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do,” said Tony. “And if it wasn’t for you she might not have gotten out of there that day.”

“It is nothing,” Vision shook his head. He was going to say more on the subject, but Tony cut him off.

“But I’m curious, however, how do you feel stress? Or rather, how does your programming process stress?”

“Stress is an emotion. I feel it the way I would any other emotion.” Vision spoke to him flatly and looked Tony in the eye.

“I meant no offense, Buddy,” Tony said, looking anxious.

“It is all right, Mr. Stark.”

“You can call me Tony.” Tony smirked at Rhodey. “See how many times I have to tell this guy?”

Rhodey grinned. “Hey, he refers to me as the Colonel or James sometimes.”

“He calls you James? How come you haven’t killed him yet?”

“Because I know I can’t, Tony.” Rhodey cussed.

Vision chuckled good-naturedly. “This is true, he knows better than to pick a fight with me.”

Tony and Rhodey laughed. “So how are you enjoying the holidays so far?” Tony asked. 

Vision looked around the room. “I should say this is an excellent time of year,” he said brightly. “The customary decorations and music are pleasing to look at. But I love most that you humans enjoy such good feeling between each other at this time of year.” He looked at Tony. “But I wonder why it is that you cannot co-exist in such a manner always?”

“Well, there actually isn’t peace on earth at Christmas,” said Tony. “I thought you knew that.”

“Of course there never is,” said Vision. “I did not mean to say this was a perfect holiday. But I meant only to observe that the ideal of striving for brotherhood is emphasized more at this time of year.”

“Well, that’s the nature of the game, I suppose,” said Rhodey. “We’re always preaching about brotherhood but we always fall short. Do you think about this sort of thing often?”

“I do,” said Vision. “I wish there was more I could do to bring about peace on earth. But fighting to stop the evil in this world seems to be a start. I am content with that. And I do try, as much as possible, to be a friend to my fellow superheroes.” 

“Of course you do, man,” said Rhodey. “I think I want me another drink.” He went to the bar. 

Vision smiled at Tony. “And is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Stark?”

Tony looked like he was about to suggest something, but then he shook his head. “I think I’ll be fine, Vision. Thanks.”

Tony went to the bar. Wanda and the Ghost followed him. Tony only stayed at the bar long enough to fill up a glass of spirits. And then he went to join Steve on the couch.

“Mind if I sit down?” Tony asked

“No, go ahead,” said Steve. He had been checking his phone, but he put it down. “I was watching you talking to Vision just now. I don’t think he likes it when you interrupt him.”

“Does anybody?”

Steve smirked.

Tony took a sip of his drink and sighed.

“Tony,” said Steve. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” said Tony.

“Look, man, I know how you feel,” said Steve. “You can’t always get people to be what you want them to.”

“I know,” said Tony in frustration. “It’s just...you know. Christmas was always JARVIS’s favorite time of year. I think he actually enjoyed it...as much as an AI as outdated as JARVIS could enjoy anything.” He flopped his hand uselessly. “It’s just tech stuff.”

“No, it’s not,” said Steve. “You can be honest with me, Tony.”

“Yeah well...you remember the Mandarin incident, what, three years ago now? Shoot. If anything I thought he’d hold on to that.”

“You can’t control what people hold onto,” said Steve.

“Stop preaching to me, Rogers.”

“I mean it. You know I know what I’m talking about.”

“Really? Have you found out anything since Albuquerque?”

Steve looked down and shook his head. “No.”

Tony took another drink. “JARVIS still has to be in there somewhere. He’s got to. I’ve done the math.”

“It’s been my experience the math doesn’t always add up even when it should. So what have you been up to...recently?” asked Steve.

“Well, I’ve been trying to get a little more involved in the community.”

“I heard about your scholarship program. That seems like a good idea. How’s that going?”

“We’re still looking at potential candidates,” said Tony. “It’s not easy. These kids are smart, don’t get me wrong, but they can still be jerks.”

“I getcha,” said Steve. 

“I’ve also been trying to do more general community service, giving money to soup kitchens, disaster relief, homeless shelters. That sort of thing.”

Steve nodded. “That’s pretty good. And...Natasha mentioned that you were also looking into legal reforms for controlling superhuman activity. What’s that about?”

Tony laughed a little. He was slightly drunk. “Well, what did she tell you?”

“She didn’t have a lot of details. I was hoping you’d tell me.”

Tony grimaced at Steve. “Would you like what I had to tell you?” 

“I won’t know unless you tell me, but--”

“See, there you go,” said Tony, shrugging.

Steve cussed. “Can’t you just tell me?”

Tony laughed a little. “Language, Cap. Well...I can promise you I’m not building another Ultron.”

“I didn’t say you were,” Steve smirked.

“Of course I’m not. I know better than to mess up the same way twice. But seriously, though, I am trying to help the team. It’s mostly just research, right now.”

“Okay, I get it,” Steve nodded. “But what are you trying to do, I mean, what are you trying to accomplish? 

Tony gave him a hard look. “A safer world, Rogers,” said Tony. “Isn’t that what you want?”

“A ‘safe’ world?”

“Saf-er.”

As opposed to one that’s free? Where people can make their own choices?”

“I’m not saying you were making wrong choices, man.” Tony shrugged and drained his glass.

“Look, Tony--”

“There you go, being Captain America again,” said Tony loosely.

“Aw, come on, Tony,” said Steve. “You know I don’t--”

“I know you don’t.” Tony raised his glass but then realized it was empty. He stared at it and swore.

“Can I get you another drink?” Steve asked.

“Sure.”

“I’ll take you.” Steve helped Tony to his feet. 

Wanda and the Ghost of Christmas Present watched Tony and Steve leave the sitting area and looked at each other.

“Well?” said the Ghost.

“Steve doesn’t really get how Tony feels,” said Wanda. “But Tony thinks he does.”

“Exactly,” said the Ghost. “Did you observe anything else?”

“Tony isn’t telling the whole truth about what he’s been doing,” said Wanda. “His ‘research’ isn’t just theoretical. He wants to decide how the Avengers will work. And he’s going to bring the law on his side to control them. But why?”

“I’ll tell you why,” said the Ghost. “Because he disagrees with the way Steve is leading them. There was a time when Tony Stark did not believe that the Avengers were even necessary.” Wanda almost didn’t believe the Ghost, but he continued. “Now, of course, with S.H.I.E.L.D. crippled and Hydra on the loose he thinks better of them, but he does not think that Steve is going about it the right way. But of course Tony doesn’t mean ill towards Steve or you and your friends, Miss Maximoff. In fact he respects the Captain, immensely. He thinks that if the law was on the side of the Avengers, then it would do a great deal in helping your cause. But there are things he would like to change--grievances from when he has worked with the Captain before that he has not laid to rest.”

“Natasha is worried because of the people Tony is working with,” said Wanda. “They are dangerous. They almost ignore the fact that Hydra is a threat. They would not be past regulating the Avengers out of existence.”

“And to think, that was once something you yourself would have agreed with,” the Ghost remarked.

Wanda glanced at him. The Ghost saw her confused look and laughed warmly. 

“Well…” Wanda said, thinking, “perhaps, like Pietro and I, Steve and Tony will work out their differences.”

The Ghost sighed. “They could. But it might not be as easy as you think. Ultron may be vanquished, but his shadow lingers. The night is still young, so let us leave now.” The Ghost turned to leave. Wanda followed.

“Now, sir, a question.”

“Yes?” he asked as they walked out of the lounge.

“This event we are seeing--is it happening now or in the future?”

“Hm, in the recent past, you might say. An hour or two ago, at least. But, it is happening on Christmas Eve.” They stepped outside to the edge of the landing platform. 

“Where are we going next?”

“To visit a young man you befriended recently.” He nodded. Wanda took the sleeve of his robe. She did not scream this time, but the icy wind in her face made her eyes water. 

 

They traveled south, away from New York City and almost to the end of the large clusters of light in the darkness. Not to the buildings at the heart of town but at the edge they went, to a quiet neighborhood. There had been no snow yet that year, so the lawns were bare and brown under the dull streetlamps. Plenty of the houses had Christmas decorations adorning them, strings of lights on the front porches and inflatable snowmen and Santa Clauses and metal reindeer. The Ghost of Christmas Present took Wanda up the front walk of a small, one-story house with a small porch. Standing beside the door was a wire and lights sculpture of a small dog wearing a festive hat.

“What is this place?” Wanda asked.

“The home of Stephen and Amanda Lawson,” said the Ghost. They passed through the doorway. Wanda had a brief glance around the room to take in the Christmas decorations   
and the sight of Mrs. Lawson working in the kitchen. But Mr. Lawson and his son--Hillary Tanner’s boyfriend Mark--were seated in the living room. Mr. Lawson was on an   
armchair, Mark on a table chair that had been left in the living room earlier in the evening.

“Dad,” said Mark, his voice cracking slightly, “I’m in love with Hillary Tanner.”

“So you are,” said Mr. Lawson, stroking his chin. He was tall but somewhat saggy around his middle, and he had lost a lot of the hair on top of his head. “And does she feel the same way?”

“She told me she loved me,” said Mark, “right when she dropped me off at the airport to come out here. And I think she meant it in the romantic sense.”

“The romantic sense, all right. Well, how about the other senses? Do you love her as a friend, too?”

“Of course.”

“And do you see yourself being able to live with her? I mean, you do have a working relationship, but you haven’t actually spent that much time together as a couple.”

“Well, Dad, I’ve been wondering about that, too, but I don’t think it matters. We skype nearly every night, we text almost constantly in the evenings. We always pick up right where we left off every time we start a conversation. I think it’s enough.”

Mr. Lawson nodded, his hand still on his chin. “So what about her career? Does she plan on continuing to work for S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“I don’t think so,” said Mark. “At least not as a full-time secretary or whatever for the Director. She wants to settle down and have a family. She’s not going to put her career over that. She never would. And I think her boss understands that.”

“Well,” said Mr. Lawson, putting his hand down, “your mother and sisters and I have had the chance to meet her a couple of times. She seems like a nice young lady. But we haven’t seen the both of you together yet. I’m not necessarily withholding my approval by saying this, but I would like it if you both came here, for a weekend maybe, just to see how you two get along.”

“Of course. But, you could always talk to her parents and ask them how we get along in person. They’ve seen quite a bit of us.” 

Mr. Lawson chortled quietly. “Yeah. I am a little jealous. But it’s been very nice of them, too look out for you both. They sound like good people. So, what are you going to do, then?”

Mark collected himself. Then he looked his father in the eye and said, “I’m going to ask her to marry me. We’ve both discussed marriage. We both want it. Badly.”

“So when do you think you could get married?” asked Mr. Lawson.

“I dunno. Probably next summer, maybe. Early next fall. It’s going to depend on when she can get her affairs settled at work, I think. But definitely next year. I think I’m going to propose next spring sometime.”

“And where would you like to get married? We could do it here, but we don’t have a lot of family living close by.”

“I know, we don’t,” said Mark. “But it might be harder for them to travel somewhere else. Hillary and I think it’s a good idea to at least have a reception out here.”

“All right. So you’d like to get married in Arizona?”

“Yes. I think it would be much easier on her and for her family. She’d much rather do that closer to her home, than in D.C. or anywhere else. And Arizona’s my home, too, now.”  
Mr. Lawson nodded. “Well, that seems like a good idea. But when you two have a better date picked out for the wedding, let me know. Plane tickets are not cheap. Weddings period aren’t cheap.”

Mark laughed. “Yes, Dad. But Hillary’s got some money she’s been saving, they pay her pretty well at S.H.I.E.L.D..”

“I imagine they do,” said Mr. Lawson. 

Mark sniffed.

“What?”

“I wonder if we could get any of the Avengers to come to the wedding.”

“Mark, you know that might not be a good idea.”

“I know, it’s just a thought. But Captain Rogers was friends with both of us when he was at S.H.I.E.L.D. school, and they’ve stayed in touch. The others seem pretty cool, I met Scarlet Witch and Black Widow recently.”

“Well, I suppose they wouldn’t mind getting an announcement, at least,” said Mr. Lawson. “But just be careful, son. Some of our relatives don’t like the Avengers the way you do. Family occasions like weddings get testy enough without politics in the mix.”

“Yes, Dad. I’ll remember that.”

Mr. Lawson and his son started talking about other subjects related to Mark’s desired marriage, such as income and budgeting and financing a home. Wanda and the Ghost listened for a little while, but then the Ghost nodded for her to leave.

“Now, I shouldn’t have to tell you this,” said the Ghost, “but please do not tell anyone what you have just seen, particularly Hillary.”

“Well, doesn’t she know what’s coming?” Wanda asked as they stepped outside.

“Yes, she does,” said the Ghost. “But it would be polite in the sense that you are not prying into her personal business.

“But then why show me this?”

“Oh, because I thought you’d like to see it.” Wanda was sure there was more to it than that, but she didn’t press the spirit. She grabbed his robe and they set off again, this time flying a vast distance across a dark landscape only intermittently scattered with cities and towns. 

 

As they descended into a large metropolis in the west, Wanda recognized the streets and highways of Phoenix and the East Valley. Wanda knew exactly where they were headed. Wanda thought to herself she would have liked to say hi to Hillary, but then it might be an unwanted surprise. She supposed it was just as well she was invisible and mute to everyone besides the Ghost. She was pretty sure she was dreaming.

The Ghost landed on the front walk of the Tanners’ house and led her through the front door. Even through the door, Wanda could hear Hillary playing “What Child is This?” on her piano. When the Ghost of Christmas Present and Wanda entered the living room, they found it deserted except for Hillary. It was nine o’clock in the evening local time.   
Wanda and the Ghost sat on the couch to listen to Hillary playing. When she had finished playing the carol, she pulled out a book of piano music that had been sitting to one side on the side. It was a book of selections from “Phantom of the Opera.” She opened to “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again,” she began to play, starting quietly with the introduction. As she turned the page to the second verse, she glanced up at a framed photograph on the piano. It pained her to look at that picture of Bucky, smiling and happy for a rare moment in his life, but it also slightly comforted her.

Hillary’s mother came out of the bedroom with an empty laundry basket as Hillary played the second verse, swelling the notes to a brilliant crescendo. Jo stopped to listen in the kitchen as Hillary finished the song. 

“In the mood for some Broadway music, dear?” Jo asked. 

“No. Just this one song.” Hillary put aside the “Phantom” piano book and opened the Christmas one she had been using earlier.

Jo sighed and shook her head. “Do you miss Bucky that badly?”

Hillary gave a shaky sigh. “I feel so guilty sometimes. I only wanted to get rid of him! I never realized how much...how much he needed us. How much he needed me to...accept him. If only he was here now, I would never turn him away, not from anything he wanted.”

“Yes, dear,” said Jo. “But I’m afraid there’s nothing you can do for him now. And feeling bad that you didn’t do anything sooner won’t bring him back.” 

Hillary looked down at the floor. She didn’t want to believe that. 

“Oh honey,” said Jo. She went to the piano. Hillary turned herself to the front of the bench and let her mother sit next to her. “I’m sorry that you miss him. I miss him, too. But he’s gone.” Jo wrapped her arms around her daughter tenderly. Hillary hugged her back. “But you know what, someday when he’s ready, I’ll bet you he’ll let Steve find him. You’ll see. When the time comes.”

Hillary looked close to tears. “I’m not sure I believe that anymore.” Hillary sobbed onto her mother’s shoulder. 

Wanda looked at the Ghost. “Is she really that hopeless?”

“No,” said the Ghost, shaking his head. “Just overcome with grief.”

“I had no idea.”

“Oh no dear,” said Jo. “What makes you see that?”

“Because Grace...because Grace would have helped him. She was the only thing motivating him, and now he’s gone. He wouldn’t possibly let anyone find him or help him ever again. And he’s not stupid. He did so many terrible things as the Winter Soldier.”

“But he’s never going to be that way again?”

“No...he struggled so much, Mom. You didn’t see it, but he did. I don’t know how close he came to killing…” Hillary swallowed, “Grace’s murderer, but he must have gotten close, the way they fought. Sometimes I wonder after what happened if he’s lost his restraint. And of course he’s wanted in like twenty countries.” Hillary cried harder. “They don’t care about him, Mom. They don’t care about what he’s been through. They don’t care that he’s Captain America’s best friend. They only see him as the monster--the monster he didn’t want to be.”

Jo stroked Hillary’s hair and kissed her head. “But you do. You’re an assistant to the director of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Maybe you could do something about it. You knew him. You’re probably in a better position than even Steve to help him.”

Hillary dried her eyes. She gave a dry laugh. “Coulson might not be able to do much. I don’t know, Mom.”

“Well, do what you can to help him. Even if you don’t know where he is.”

Hillary gave a deep sigh. “Sometimes I wish I’d never figured out that he was stealing from our garbage.”

“Oh no no no, don’t talk like that,” Jo tutted. “You did so much good for him. And he was a friend to you, to all of us. And you don’t need to worry about Bucky, ok? He can take care of himself. You have so much else to be grateful for. And no matter what happens to him, life will go on. It will. All right?”

“All right,” Hillary nodded. She hugged her mother. Jo got back up and went to retrieve her laundry basket. Hillary turned around to face the keyboard again.

“Why don’t you play some more Christmas music?”

“Will do,” said Hillary, flipping through the pages of the Christmas songbook. “You know, I want revenge on Hydra so bad sometimes,” she added.

Jo shook her head. “Let the Avengers handle it, honey.”

“I’m just sayin’.”

Wanda had to lean up a little to read the title of the song: it was called “Coventry Carol.” It was mostly minor notes and Hillary played it very dolefully. Jo came out of the washroom with a full laundry basket as Hillary finished a verse.

“Why don’t you play something cheerful?” Jo asked. 

Hillary sniffed. “If you insist.” Hillary started to play a happier tune, softly and quietly. And she started to sing:

“O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie.  
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by.  
Yet in thy dark streets shineth the Everlasting Light.  
The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”

Hillary glanced up at the picture of Bucky. She said a silent prayer that wherever Bucky was right then, whatever darkness he was in, he would find some light. Even if it was just a little. And then she continued playing. It wasn’t so much cheerful as it was hopeful.

“Quite the recital, wasn’t it?” said the Ghost of Christmas Present.

“Yes, it was,” said Wanda. The Ghost rose to his feet. He and Wanda walked through the glass door to the back door.

“You’ve been here before, haven’t you?” Wanda asked.

“I have,” said the Ghost. “I’ve been to many places, and visited many people.”

“Why--if you were here last Christmas, then you must have visited Bucky?”

“I did.”

“Did he see the other Ghost?”

“Yes.”

“And what did you show him?” 

“Only what he needed to see. Let us be off.”

“Wait, sir,” said Wanda. “Could I not see Bucky tonight? Could you not show him to me?”

The Ghost shook his head and frowned. “Sergeant Barnes does not wish to be found, not by the living or the dead.”

“But what about Hedwig?”

“As it turns out, Hedwig is neither.” 

Wanda did not know what to make of that.

“But take heart, child,” said the Ghost. “He will return. He will be there at the end, and you both with face what is coming.”

“All right.”

Wanda grabbed the sleeve of the Ghost’s robe and they flew through the night. They continued westward across the darkness of the desert. But then they came to the cities on the west coast of the United States, descending into the largest one that was Los Angeles.

 

They landed in yet another quiet suburb and approached a small brick house. Inside the small living room, where there was barely room for the Christmas tree, Agent Mitch Sorensen of S.H.I.E.L.D. was revelling in his off-duty time wrestling and tickling a small boy and girl. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt that showed off his brawny arms. She had also never heard him laugh as loudly as this.

A third child, a little boy, came running into the living room carrying a pot lid like a shield.

“I’m Captain America!” the boy shouted.

Mitch gasped and threw up his hands. “Oh no, it’s Captain America! What do you want?”

“I’m here to stop you from tickle-fighting with Lucy and Kirk,” shouted the pint-sized Captain. He yelled and jumped onto Mitch’s back. Mitch yelled while the other two children started tickling him and they used their combined strength to push Mitch to the floor. Finally, exhausted, they rolled off of him.

“Uncle Mitch, do you really know Captain America?” asked Lucy as they sat up.

“Why, yes I do,” said Mitch. 

“Is he nice?” asked Kirk.

“Well, he is nice to me,” said Mitch. The children giggled.

“Have you ever gotten to hold his shield?” asked the other boy.

“No, I haven’t, actually,” said Mitch. “But I don’t think he lets just anybody touch it.”

“What’s he doing for Christmas?” asked the third boy.

“Well, Tommy, I think he went home to New York City for Christmas.”

“Does he live there?”

“Well, he used to live there, back in the day. He likes to go back and visit sometimes.”

“And have you seen him, Mitch?”

“Of course I have. In fact, I saw him just last week. He got all the Avengers and their friends to go see Star Wars.”

“Aw, cool!” said Kirk.

“Captain America likes Star Wars?” asked Lucy.

“Of course he does,” said Mitch. “My friend Hillary was one of the people who showed him Star Wars for the first time after he got off the ice.”

“What about the other Avengers? Are you friends with them?” asked Tommy.

“Yes. Yes I am,” said Mitch. “And they’re very nice. Well...Black Widow likes to tease me sometimes,” he said, tickling Tommy’s stomach. Tommy instinctively drew back, covering   
his stomach with his improvised shield.

“Have you met Iron Man?” asked Kirk.

“I haven’t, actually,” said Mitch. “But he doesn’t work with the Avengers anymore. Not after what happened in Sokovia.”

“So what’s he doing?”

Mitch shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe just being Tony Stark.”

“My daddy doesn’t like Tony Stark,” said Lucy suddenly.

“He doesn’t? Why not?” asked Mitch.

“He says Tony Stark thinks he can do whatever he wants just because he has money,” said Lucy. “And he says the Avengers were his idea. He payed them to destroy Sokovia for no reason, just so he could make more money.”

“Well, that’s not true,” said Mitch.

“Well that’s what my daddy said,” said Lucy.

“Well, maybe your daddy doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” said Mitch, glancing into the kitchen. “Maybe we should have a talk, him and I.”

“Yeah, well my mommy doesn’t like Captain America,” said Tommy.

“She doesn’t?” said Mitch. 

“Nope. Not at all.”

“Does she mean you or the real Captain America?”

“The real Captain America,” said Tommy. “She says he was prop-prop--”

“Propaganda?”

“Yeah, he’s...whatever that big word is, to make people think the U.S. government is great. And it isn’t.”

“Well, Captain America doesn’t work for the government anymore. He works for the Avengers.”

“And Mommy also says that the bad guys that Captain America is fighting are made-up,” said Tommy. 

“Well, grown-ups don’t always see what’s going on,” said Mitch.

“Do you think there’s ever going to be more Avengers?” asked Lucy. “Like, more than just the ones there are now?”

“Hm, I dunno. Maybe someday. I mean, you just never know where an Avenger will turn up.”

“Really?” asked Kirk, wide-eyed.

“Yes. Definitely,” said Mitch. “There will always be more Avengers.”

“I wanna be an Avenger!” said Tommy. “Maybe someday if Captain America doesn’t wanna be Captain America anymore I’ll take his shield and do it for him!” He waved his pot lid around.

“Hey, be careful, you might hit someone with that,” said Mitch, ducking. Mitch sat up and started tickling Tommy again. 

“Let me guess,” said Wanda as the children started to wrestle Mitch again, “You just thought I’d like something to smile about.”

“Well, there is never an excuse not to smile,” said the Ghost of Christmas Present. “But there is always an opportunity to learn wisdom.” They turned to leave. Once outside, Wanda took the spirit’s robe and they flew off into the night. This time, however, they did not go very far, but they soared up the populated coast of California to San Francisco. Flying past the skyscrapers and the Golden Gate Bridge, the Ghost carried Wanda to a wooded suburb, landing at a house on the side of a hill. From the patched look of the roof, it had been damaged and repaired recently. The Ghost took Wanda into a festively adorned living room.

Wanda thought no one was in the living room until she heard a noise. A little girl wearing reindeer antlers with bells was rummaging around the furniture. When Wanda first spotted her she was flipping the rug under the coffee table. She stood up and went to turn up one of the couch cushions.

“Daddy!” the little girl called. “Where are you?” The girl walked around the couch to peep behind it. Then she got on her knees to look under the couch. “Daddy! Come out!” The girl got up and looked at the Christmas Village on a table next to the wall. She picked up two of the little houses. “But no, Daddy wouldn’t be in there again,” she said. “That’s where Daddy was last time!”

Then she looked up at the Christmas tree. Then she gasped. Invisibly, of course, Wanda followed the girl as she walked up to the tree for a closer look.

“Daddy? Are you in the tree?”

One of the branches shook just slightly. The girl looked up just as it went still again and gasped. “Daddy!” she whispered.

On one of the higher branches, a little brass bell started to ring.

“You’re up there! You’re up there! I found you!” The little girl jumped and clapped her hands. Then she stood away from the tree as something very tiny jumped down from the branch. And that something grew very large. It was a man wearing a most unusual leather suit, with an odd helmet to match. The man inside popped the visor open.

“You found me, Peanut!” he said delightedly. He knelt down to hug the little girl.

Wanda couldn’t believe it. “It is...the Ant-Man,” Wanda gasped to the Ghost

 

“Let’s play again, Daddy!” the girl said as the man stood to his feet.

“No, Daddy needs to put the suit away for tonight, all right, sweetie?” Scott Lang removed the helmet.

“Okay,” said the girl, sounding a little dejected.

The man took the helmet to the couch, where a black duffel bag was sitting. He looked like he was about to remove the rest of his suit when the front door opened. A man and a woman came inside. Almost immediately there was a scuffling sound in the hallway. A gigantic ant, somehow enlarged to monstrous proportions, came running down the stairs, making huffing and grunting noises at the arrivals.

“Dexter, back!” shouted the man, holding up a hand to the beast as he closed the door. The ant seemed to want to jump up and hug the man’s leg and it was clicking its pincers excitedly. But after a moment the ant backed away.

“Mommy!” the little girl called. She ran up to the doorway to greet the new arrivals. The woman bent down to hug her. Then she stood up again. 

“Scott, are you playing with that suit again?” she said, shaking her head and her blonde curls.

“We were just playing a little hide-and-go-seek,” Scott shrugged. He pulled a zipper on the back of his suit.

“You are wearing something under that thing, right?” asked the man who had entered. 

“Oh, of course, it fits over anything,” said Scott hastily.

“Right,” the man nodded. He and the woman came into the living room, the little girl leading the woman by the hand. The giant ant followed them, stopping to probe the floor   
with its antennae for a minute.

“Thanks for watching her, Scott,” said the woman.

“Not a problem, Maggie,” said Scott as he peeled off the top half of the suit. “How was you guys’ Christmas party?”

“Good, it was good,” said the man. He elaborated on the party he and Maggie had just been to while Scott removed the belt and pants of the Ant-Man suit, revealing a polo shirt and cargo pants underneath. 

“Well, that sounds cool, Paxton,” said Scott as he put on his tennis shoes. The giant ant came and probed Scott’s shoes. Scott gave it a pat on the head.  
“Would you like some eggnog, Scott, before you go?”

“Yeah, sure, of course,” said Scott, nodding.

“I want some eggnog too, Mommy!” said the little girl.

“Yes, Cassie, I’ll get you some eggnog, too. But it’ll just have soda in it.”

“Of course I want just soda in it, Mommy!” said Cassie.

Maggie went to the kitchen. Cassie climbed on Scott’s lap and hugged him. The ant crawled under the coffee table and rested. It seemed to have been conditioned to act the way a dog would. Wanda wondered how in the world it had gotten to its current size.

“So where are you going after this? Out with Luis and friends?” Paxton asked Scott.

“Eventually, yeah, I’ll go hang out with them,” said Scott. “But I was going to go see Dr. Pym first. Just to say hello.”

“Oh. Okay. What’s he got you doing for him, anyway?”

“I’m afraid that’s classified,” said Scott.

“I see. But if you work there why would you want to go back for fun?”

Scott shrugged. “I like being nice. You know, he’s done a lot for me.”

“I know that,” said Paxton, “He’s done a lot for us, too.”

“Does Dr. Pym have anyone spending Christmas with him?” asked Cassie.

“Well, he doesn’t have much in the way of family,” said Scott. “It’ll be just him and his daughter--which is saying something because, well, they’ve only recently gotten past their estrangement.”

“Hope Van Dyne’s his daughter, right?” asked Paxton.

“Yeah.”

“Funny, because I thought she used to work for that Darren Cross guy.”

Scott sniffed. “It’s a long story.”

“Classified, I know.

“But she’s really nice to me!” said Cassie.

“Yeah, she is nice,” said Scott, adding partly under his breath, “when she’s not trying to punch your face in.”

Cassie giggled.

Paxton nodded and smiled. “I see how it is. You always did have a way--oh look, here’s Maggie with the drinks.”

Maggie entered the living room with a tray. The giant ant poked an antenna out from under the table and twitched it. “I hope you two are keeping the subject matter clean enough for a six-year-old.” She put the tray on the coffee table and sat down next to Paxton.

“Daddy knows better than to talk dirty around me, Mommy,” said Cassie. “It’s Paxton who needs to watch his mouth sometimes.”

Scott “ooohed” and Maggie glared at Paxton. Paxton looked sheepish. 

“She’s just biased because Scott just barely got out of jail.” Paxton picked up his eggnog.

“And that’s all right,” said Scott. He nuzzled Cassie gently. “Because now I can make up for lost time with my little peanut.”

“Oh, so there’s someone at my work now who used to work at PymTech,” Maggie said.

“Really?” asked Scott.

“Yeah. They’re in the customer service department. Apparently they weren’t there on the night the building...imploded.”

“Yeah, that was lucky,” Scott nodded, drinking his eggnog.

“Mommy, can I give some eggnog to Dexter?” asked Cassie.

“No, sweetie,” said Maggie. “The eggnog might make Dexter sick.”

“Nonsense,” said Scott. “Ants will eat anything.”

“So you’re still planning on coming to Christmas Dinner tomorrow, right?” asked Maggie.

“Yes, of course,” said Scott. 

“And will you bring my Christmas present then, Daddy?”

“Yes, of course, Peanut,” said Scott, pinching Cassie’s cheek.

Paxton laughed warmly. “And to think, five months ago Maggie didn’t even want you in the house.”

“Paxton, we don’t need to bring that up,” said Maggie.

“Of course not.”

“So how are you guys’ wedding plans coming along?”

“Well, we’ve lined up appointments to visit different venues after the holidays,” said Maggie. 

“We’re really considering the Grant Hotel downtown,” said Paxton, taking Maggie’s hand. “They’ve got a nice package deal for a catered dinner and reception.”

“I’ve got a friend at work who’s also going to get me a deal for our honeymoon,” said Maggie. 

“Oh, really, where at?”

“Hawaii.”

“Oh, nice,” Scott nodded. “I’m happy for you, Maggie. I really am.”

Maggie only smiled.

“Thanks, Scott,” said Paxton. “You know we want the same thing you do, and that is, what’s best for Cassie.”

“Of course.”

Cassie was drinking her eggnog.

“So what happens to Cassie, then, while you’re on the honeymoon?”

“Well,” Maggie said, looking at Paxton, “if you weren’t too busy with Dr. Pym, we were wondering if she could stay with you.”

“The main stipulation, of course, is that you’d have to stay here,” said Paxton. “Not in your flat with those hyenas.”

“And they’re not allowed to visit,” added Maggie.

Scott laughed. “I wouldn’t dream of it. But, we’ll see how things work out.” He finished off his eggnog. “Well, thank you for your time. I suppose I should go now.”

“Oh, Daddy,” said Cassie, leaning on her father’s shoulder.

“It’s okay, Cassie. I’ll be back tomorrow. And Santa Claus is coming tonight.”

“Okay.” Cassie gave her father another hug. “I love you, Daddy.”

“I love you too, sweetheart.” Scott closed his eyes as he hugged his daughter. “Good night, Peanut.” He put her down gently and picked up his duffel bag. Dexter the ant stirred from under the coffee table and came out after Scott.

“Take care of yourself, Scott,” said Paxton.

“Goodnight, Scott,” said Maggie.

“Bye, Daddy!” Cassie waved.

“We should follow,” the Ghost of Christmas Present said to Wanda. Scott was commanding Dexter to stay inside while he held the door open, and Wanda and the Ghost slipped through. Scott came out and got into a large, beaten-up van parked on the curb.

The Ghost was about to take off when Wanda noticed Cassie looking out the window. Cassie waved goodbye to her father. Then they heard the car make an unusual sound--the horn had been fixed to play “La Cucaracha” when hit. Wanda laughed. The Ghost laughed as well.

Wanda thought that the Ghost was going to leave San Francisco, but they went to another neighborhood, this one older and with nicer homes. They landed just in time to see Scott’s van pull up in front of an impressive Victorian manor with a turret. They followed Scott up the front walk and he rang the doorbell.

An old man with combed hair and a fluffy goatee answered the door.

“I told you to stay away!” he said, glaring down at Scott through his glasses. He was wearing an ugly cardigan with reindeer on it.

“Well, that wouldn’t have done much good because I know how to break in here--” Scott began.

“Don’t remind me. Come in.” Scott went inside. Wanda and the Ghost followed him.

Christmas ornaments blossomed out of the already sumptuous decor. The living room was dominated by a tall, bushy Christmas tree with burgundy and gold gilt decorations. A woman with a sleek brown bob was seated on an armchair beside it, reading a book, but she looked up when Scott entered.

“Scott, how are you?” she said, getting up. She wore a green oversized cardigan over a pair of crocheted gray tights. 

“Doing great,” he said. Hope kissed his cheek. Wanda glanced at the Ghost of Christmas Present with raised eyebrows but he said nothing. Hank Pym was rolling his eyes.

“What’ve you guys been up to?”

“Not much,” said Hope, returning to her chair. She had a loose hold of Scott’s hand and let go as he sat on one of the couches. “We’ve been enjoying a quiet Christmas Eve at home. Not gonna lie, Scott, it’s the best one I’ve had in years.”

“Well, that’s good to hear,” said Scott. He looked over at Hank. “And how are you enjoying Christmas Eve, sir?” 

Hank folded his arms and nodded. “Well, it was nice and quiet, like it usually is. Hope here doesn’t make much noise. If I’d known that I would have invited her back sooner. But naturally, as soon as you came in, you both started talking.”

Scott wasn’t sure how to take that. But Hope laughed quietly.

“Yeah, whatever,” grumbled Hank.

“So we’re just taking it easy tonight?” said Scott.

“Well, I’m reading a book,” said Hope. “Just a book of old fables that Mom and Dad used to read me when I was little.”

“That’s cool,” Scott nodded. “Should I...let you focus on your reading?”

“No, you can talk, it’s fine. It’s just dad who doesn’t like you talking. I like having you around.”

“Well...I know you like me,” said Scott.

Hope looked up at him. “Well, I didn’t mean like in that sense--”

“I know--”

“That was not the context of this conversation, Scott. But I do like you in the sense that your presence is not onerous to me.”

“Well, you did kiss me--”

Hope eyed him. “We’re not talking about this in front of Dad, Scott.”

“Actually, Hope, I have been wondering about that, since you brought it up -- “

Hank groaned.

“Not now,” said Hope.

“Well, I only wanted to make an observation that you kind of hated me when we first met,” said Scott. “And now you kiss me occasionally. That’s a far cry from wanting to loose the bullet ants on me.”

“Don’t make me call them.”

“What, now you’re threatening me?” Scott said, sitting back.

“I kiss you when I feel like it and you let me. End of story,” said Hope. She looked down at her book.

“Well…” Scott said uncomfortably, looking from Hank Pym to his daughter. “At least...you don’t find me...onerous, like you said.”

“At least I don’t,” said Hope, not looking up.

“Some people in this house still kind of hate you, Scott,” said Hank.

“Kind of?” said Scott. “What, like you’ve never completely hated me?”

“Not like she did.”

Hope giggled.

“Yeah, but you had to at least tolerate me to want to get me out of jail, right?”

“Like I said, I was watching you for a while,” said Hank, pouring himself a drink from a decanter on the coffee table. “I had to get used to your mannerisms. But, you’re a much   
better guy than some of the other thugs I’ve had to work with in the past. You’re quirky and idiotic but at least you’re a decent human being. And of course, now that I know you better and I’ve worked with you for a while, I respect you.” Hank raised his glass and toasted Scott.

“Thanks,” said Scott. 

“So what have you been up to today?”

“Well, Maggie and Paxton had to go to a Christmas party tonight for her work,” said Scott. “They let me stay over at the house while they were gone and watch Cassie.”

Hope made an approving noise and smiled.

“Are you still playing games with her in the Ant-Man suit?”

“Yes--I am,” said Scott. 

Hank sighed. “Scott, I told you, you need to limit your exposure to that thing. It’s going to make you imbalanced.”

“Hank, Cassie likes it when I play with her,” said Scott.

“Find some other way. Please.”

“Dad,” said Hope, looking up at him, “you used to do that for me too, you know.”

“That doesn’t mean he should keep doing it,” said Hank.

“Hank, it’s all right, don’t panic,” said Scott. “I’ve been doing research on it, actually.” Scott launched into a spiel about the Pym Particle and the properties of its component molecules. Hope looked up from her book to listen. The short of it was that Scott had been taking a certain nutrient supplement to see if it balanced out the effects of the particle on his mind.

“That’s very interesting,” said Hope.

“Well, you should let me know how it goes,” said Hank. He scratched his goatee. “I wished I’d thought of something like that sooner. I guess it does pay to bring an outside man in.” He glanced at Scott. “But yes. I used to put on the suit and run around in Hope’s doll house. She loved it.”

“Wow, okay,” said Scott.

“But Hope, we are not encouraging this,” said Hank to his daughter. “So don’t be giving him any ideas.”

Hope smiled. “I won’t.”

“Besides,” said Scott, “it probably won’t hurt to use that suit to play in with Cassie. We are planning on making the new prototype for my idea next year, aren’t we?” 

“Yes, we are,” said Hank, nodding. “In between...Hope’s project. But don’t destroy your old suit in the meantime. You may still need it.”

“And it’s a family heirloom,” said Hope.

“No pressure, I get it,” said Scott. “You think the Avengers are going to call me up sometime? They could use a guy like me, right?”

Hank looked disapprovingly at Scott. Hope grunted.

“What? Come on?”

“I think the Avengers are getting on just fine without you, Scott,” said Hank. “Not that your own work isn’t impressive. But superheroes were just never a good idea. I only became the Ant-Man because I thought I could do some good in the world. But it only caused more problems, in the end.”

“Dad, don’t you say that,” said Hope. “You did a lot of good. Don’t beat yourself up.”

“Well, then there’s the Avengers,” said Hank. “Having a group of people with superpowers banded together is a recipe for disaster. Especially without oversight from higher authority. Look at what happened in Sokovia.”

“It’s my understanding it wasn’t their fault,” Hope spoke up.

“It’s a lot more complicated than that,” said Scott. “But you think the Avengers should be controlled?”

“Well, they need someone else telling them what to do, or at least giving approval for their actions. It’s my understanding that Hydra hasn’t been that big of a threat since Sokovia. They’re just going around blowing things up,” said Hank.

“Hydra or the Avengers?” asked Scott. Hank didn’t answer.

“It would seem that way, yes,” said Hope.

“Well, what do you know about it?” Hank asked. 

“You remember how Hydra nearly got away with the YellowJacket, Dad? They may be overpowered by the Avengers but they mean business. They’ll do whatever it takes to get what they want.”

“I’m sure they do,” said Hank. “But seriously, if Captain America thinks his team of thugs are the best way to deal with Hydra, he’s doing it wrong. They can do better than blowing crap up every time someone paints a Hydra logo on a building.”

“So you think they shouldn’t be fighting Hydra?” asked Scott.

“No. I think they should. But it depends on who’s calling the shots.” Hank looked down at his empty glass. “I remember Howard Stark back in the day. It was the other big wigs at S.H.I.E.L.D., too, but him especially. He thought he could say what I could do and what I couldn’t. I don’t trust his son Tony, either.”

“You ever met him?” asked Scott.

“Once or twice. Arrogant twerp. Just like his father.”

“I’ve met him once,” said Hope. “He tried hitting on me.”

“The point is, Scott,” said Hank, “that you shouldn’t get yourself involved with the Avengers. Everything about them--their organization, their leadership, is misdirected. If you’ve been following the news, you know the Avengers are about to get in trouble. It’s only a matter of time.”

Scott sighed. “You like to burst my bubble, don’t you? Can’t I say something you’d like to hear?”

“You did tell me about your vitamin research, yes,” said Hank. “But please: stay away from the Avengers, whatever you do. It’s bad enough they know you exist.”

Scott looked like he wanted to answer him, but then decided against him. Wanda noted that Scott could not promise Hank anything on that regard.

“So tell me about Cassie,” said Hope. “What’s she getting for Christmas?”

Feeling more animated by the change of subject, Scott turned to Hope and started telling her about Cassie’s Christmas list and what he was getting her. Hank chimed in a few reminiscences of Hope’s childhood, with Hope contradicting him once or twice with her recollections. The drink lightened up Hank’s mood considerably.

“But Hope does not like the Avengers either, does she?” Wanda said to the Ghost of Christmas past.

“She does not,” said the Ghost. “But she is mostly worried for Scott’s safety. He has always admired the Avengers, no matter who was on the team. They were an inspiration to him, during his time in the state penitentiary. And he would give anything to go join them.”

“But Hank Pym seems to think we’re going to get into some kind of trouble. Are we?”

The Ghost eyed Wanda. “What do you know about it?”

“Well...I know the government and the press does not like us,” said Wanda. 

“Yes, go on.”

“And...I have been having dreams, recently, that I think are prophetic. One of them was about Sam Wilson telling Steve he was going to call the Ant-Man for help. Is something bad going to happen?”

The Ghost looked at her sadly, but did not speak. Wanda could read the answer in his mind, but also felt in his thoughts that there was no safe way for him to say it.

“Will the Avengers be destroyed, by what is coming?”

The Ghost turned away from the scene in Hank’s living room and began to lead her towards the door. “That would depend on a great many things,” said the spirit. “But what I want you to know from having observed this scene is that if Scott Lang does come to the Avengers, he will be coming alone. None of his friends or his family will support him. Even those who are enthusiastic about his superhero activities and support his dream to join the Avengers may not think it wise.”

“But will I work with him, sir?” asked Wanda.

The Ghost chuckled. “That will be up to you. Come, there is one more thing I must show you.

They left Pym’s house and began to fly again. This time they left the city and went northward along the coast. It was dark and cold and windy, in places they soared through clouds and fog. Finally they emerged from a large cloud bank into the skyscrapers of a different city. Soaring off to the edge of the downtown area they came to a tall apartment building. The Ghost carried her onto one of the balconies, and they entered through the screen door.

 

A gleaming, polished cello was on a stand in one corner of the room, an electric keyboard in the other. On a couch in between these sat Phil Coulson and Elaine Merrigan, Phil’s arm around her tenderly. Music from ‘The Nutcracker’ ballet played in the background while they talked quietly. Coulson was doing most of the talking, actually, telling Elaine about his adventures in recent weeks.

“And the Avengers and my agents,” Coulson concluded, “have now all gone their separate ways for the holidays. And now I’m here with you.”

Elaine laughed. “Avengers and Jedi and magic owls. You’ve had quite the time since New York, haven’t you?”

“True, I can’t say it’s been boring.”

“Do you ever think it would be a nice change if things were boring for once?” Elaine asked him, taking his other hand.

“Nah. It’d be too quiet.” Coulson leaned over to kiss her. Elaine had her curly hair in a ponytail, and was wearing a red Christmas sweater and slacks. Coulson was still in his work suit--apparently it was the outfit he was most comfortable in, even on vacation. Frankly Wanda didn’t know what she would have thought if she’d seen Coulson in anything else. 

Elaine got up to go to the kitchenette and fix some coffee. Coulson stayed on the couch. He was contented, completely happy with his life for the first time in years.

“So your Jedi friend, Emily,” Elaine asked from the kitchen.

“Yes?” said Coulson.

“You said she had an adopted family. How are they doing?”

Coulson sighed. “Well, last I heard they were still getting by. Just barely, though. Her uncle was in an accident and they had to sell the ranch right before she left, actually. They’re up in Spokane, now, actually, living close to family. I spent last Christmas with them. Wasn’t very cheery.” Coulson thought of something. “How far is it from here to   
Spokane?” 

“A few hours’ drive,” said Elaine, stirring creamer into their coffee. 

“Hm, well, would you like to take a day trip out there?”

“Maybe the day after tomorrow,” said Elaine. “We don’t have rehearsals again ‘til Monday. But it’ll have to be quick.”

“I know.”

Elaine returned to the living area with two steaming mugs of coffee. She gave one to Coulson.

“You said Hedwig is on a special errand?” said Elaine.

“Yes,” said Coulson, taking a sip of coffee. “For Captain Rogers. She should be back after Christmas. But she’ll come back to D.C., once it’s finished.”

Elaine nodded. “Well, I will say the one time I did get to meet her was pretty special.” She smiled at Coulson.

“I know. I mean, she’s not the most interactive pet,” said Coulson, “and I’m usually pretty busy in the office or at home. But she’s good to have around.”

They drank their coffee with one hand and kept their free hands clasped together. Coulson asked Elaine about her family and how they were doing. Elaine asked him if he’d gotten in touch with his own relatives. But sadly there wasn’t anyone close enough to him to care that he was alive.

“Loki couldn’t have picked a better target,” said Coulson. “Or Hydra, for that matter. But the Avengers, inasmuch as I’ve been able to spend time with them in the last year and a half, they’ve been a family to me. And my agents, Tanner and Sorensen, too. They take good care of me.”

“How old are they again?”

“Hillary is twenty-four. Mitch is twenty-three.”

Elaine shook her head and swore. “They’re young, aren’t they?”

“Yeah. But they’re both pretty bright. Hillary was one of the agents we hired after New York--she was friends with Emily, actually. And even for someone who’s only been in S.H.I.E.L.D. for a few years she’s been through a lot. Studied criminal science at ASU, was a missionary in Eastern Europe. She was stationed in D.C. right after S.H.I.E.L.D. school so she got pretty familiar with the system we had then. I had to go through her a few times, when I was still, ahem, classified. But before S.H.I.E.L.D. fell she got transferred to a field team. And she’s been out in the field pretty much ever since. And Mitch I hired straight out of college, he majored in political science but didn’t have a clue what he was doing when he came on. But he’s a fast learner. And he keeps me sane.”

“How long has Mitch been working for S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“Almost a year now. Golly, how time has flown.” Coulson shook his head. “Yeah, you wouldn’t recognize Mitch now, he knows the ins and outs as good as anyone I’ve worked with. S.H.I.E.L.D....Hydra coming out really leveled the playing field for our staff.”

“I can imagine,” Elaine nodded, drinking her coffee.

“But Hillary, of course, like I said she’s experienced. She’s been a real help teaching Mitch how to be a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. He still messes up in the office sometimes, but Hillary usually has his back.”

Elaine nodded some more. Coulson looked down at his coffee mug. “Yeah. I kind of need them both now. What am I going to do without Hillary? She’s thinking about getting married sometime next year.”

“Oh, good for her,” said Elaine.

“Yeah. Well, hopefully by then,” said Coulson, “Mitch will be able to stand on his own a little more. He’s done pretty good with the assignments--”

There was a knock on the front door of the apartment.

“Now who could that be?” said Coulson.

Elaine looked up, somewhat startled. “Usually they ring the bell.”

“Are they going to ring or knock again?”

“I don’t know,” said Elaine. “I’ll go see who it is.” She put her mug on the coffee table and got off the couch to answer the door. Coulson watched her. No one was there, but Elaine bent down to pick up something.

“What is it?”

“Must be some kind of Christmas surprise,” said Elaine, turning back and closing the door.

“Is it for you?”

“No, it’s addressed to you.”

“What?” Coulson sat up.

Elaine carried the box over to the couch. “There doesn’t seem to be a return address. Do you know the handwriting?”

Coulson looked at the label on the box.

Mr. Phil Coulson  
℅ Elaine Merrigan

They had Elaine’s address all right, but certainly no postman would be out making last-minute deliveries on Christmas Eve, would they? Did they? And there was no return address. It was not postmarked anywhere. 

Elaine looked up at Coulson. “Is it a bomb, should I be worried?”

Coulson held up the package gently in his hands. Something loose inside rattled. “No, I think it’s safe. Should we keep it under the tree until morning?”

“I don’t think it’d hurt to open it now, actually.,” said Coulson, smiling.

“Let me get the scissors,” said Elaine. She walked over to the kitchen, her curly ponytail bouncing. She dug a pair of scissors out of a drawer and came back to give them to Coulson. 

Coulson took the scissors and cut open the taped sides of the box. 

“Is there a note?” Elaine asked when it was opened. 

“Not on the top,” said Coulson. But he pulled out the first item. It was a paper bag with fancy lettering on it and an illustration of an owl. Coulson looked it over. His eyes went wide and then he laughed.

“What is it?”

“Here,” said Coulson, handing her the bag. 

“‘Eyelops’ Owl Emporium Gourmet Owl Treats,’” she read. “I assume these are for Hedwig. What else is in there?”

“Two books,” said Coulson, pulling out two slender volumes. One of them had an undecorated cover apart from the title. Another had an embossed golden owl that flapped its wings. Elaine gasped.

“Beautiful,” she said, taking the second book. It was titled, ‘A Wizard’s Guide to the Care and Training of Delivery Owls.’

Coulson had opened the first book. It was filled with illustrations and diagrams that actually moved. He was wearing the hugest smile on his face, and Wanda thought maybe he was about to cry.

“What’s that one called?” asked Elaine.

“‘Owl Post Customs and Etiquette,’” Coulson read. He laughed. “This is fantastic! The Doctor must have brought them. I explained who the Doctor is, right?”

“Yes. But I have a pretty good idea who he is,” said Elaine. “A bunch of my symphony friends watch the show. But he’s been to the Harry Potter world, then?”

“I’ve heard he’s a regular,” said Coulson. “Wizards don’t normally do this sort of thing for Muggles, do they?”

“No, they don’t,” said Elaine. 

Coulson flipped through the pages of his book and checked the box again. “I’ll bet you they’re from Harry Potter. The Doctor must’ve told him and his friends that I have Hedwig now. Maybe Hermione picked out the books.”

Elaine laughed. 

“What?”

“Just listen to yourself. You’re so casual about it.”

Coulson looked down at his book again and smiled. The page was open to an illustration of an owl landing on a person’s arm. “I’ll bet you Hedwig already knows most of this stuff. I guess they’re just trying to keep me entertained. But it’s not like I’m going to use her to correspond with Wizards.”

“No. But you do let the Avengers use her,” Elaine pointed out.

“That’s right,” Coulson nodded. “But, it’ll be fun to read, anyway. And informative.” He looked up at Elaine. They leaned over to hug each other warmly.

“I wish Hedwig was here,” said Coulson. “I’d bet she’d be so excited. Well, she’ll be excited when she comes back anyway.” Coulson set the box and its contents on the coffee table and proceeded to kiss Elaine passionately.

“I suppose we should go now,” said the Ghost of Christmas Present.

“Go where? You said this was the last stop,” said Wanda. 

“I am taking you to meet your final visitor of the night,” said the Ghost. He took Wanda back onto the balcony, and before she could ask him anything they had soared off into the night sky. 

 

They flew over the snow-covered and cloud-bound mountains to a desolate place to the east. They landed in the middle of a field covered with frost so hard it felt like solid ice and it pricked Wanda’s bare feet. 

“Why are we here?” Wanda asked.

“This is where the final spirit shall meet you,” said the Ghost solemnly.

“Here? What is this final spirit?”

“You shall know it, Miss Maximoff, when you meet it. But for now, a word of parting advice: the present is the most important place for your mind to be in. It is the actions that take place in the present that decide what will be in the future. Be mindful of your past memories, and of whatever portents you have seen--and will see. But the present is where you are the most in control.” The Ghost laid a hand on her shoulder--his hand was enormous, but he was extremely gentle. “Remember: in the comings and goings of whatever disasters the future brings, there is always hope. It is always when the night is darkest that the light will be brightest. And do not blame the misfortunes of the present on your past mistakes. For all have had a hand in shaping what is to come.”

Wanda was confused. She thought she had learned that lesson already. But she only shook her head. “I will be mindful of that,” she said. 

The Ghost patted her shoulder. “Then, a Merry Christmas to you. But as for the New Year--I cannot say yet if it will be happy.”

The Ghost walked away from her, not looking back. She watched him going down the bare hillside, but she couldn’t say where he was going. When she blinked, she lost sight of his enormous shadow against the cloudy sky.

Wanda was alone now. The wind in this open place had so far been very slight, barely a tickle on the sleeves of her bathrobe. But there was a howl and it suddenly picked up. She heard a rumbling in the clouds overhead. And then a few snowflakes began to dart past her face. A blizzard was starting on that rolling prairie. Wanda hugged herself against the freezing wind.

A gust blew a puff of snowflakes towards her. But just when it was about to rush past her face it stopped, and the flakes coalesced into a single form. It was a third spirit, wearing a tattered gray robe that blew in the wind, leaning on a staff topped with a curved blade.

The being had no physical voice. When Wanda reached into its mind, she sensed fear and dread and hopelessness. It was a manifestation of death.

The being began to speak to her telepathically.

Wanda Maximoff, it said.

Who are you?

I am the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.

What do you want with me?

I have come to warn you.

Warn me? Of what?

You know what evil is coming. It will not only destroy Christmas. It will destroy everything.

Wanda shivered. The Ghost’s words in her mind echoed and rattled on her insides. 

But why me? Why show me what is going to happen?

Because you have had a hand in the events that laid the foundation for what is to come.

What is to come, then?

The Ghost raised the cane and then tapped it on the ground. The wind and snow rushed past her in a roar and blinded her. In an instant she found herself standing in three feet of snow, dreadfully numbing on her bare feet and legs. But the gust of snow died down and then stopped.

It seemed that the storm had ended. But in its place was a dreadful silence.

 

Wanda and the third Ghost had traveled to a different place, a snowy field stretched over two low hills. Thick trees surrounded the place. Off on the side of a hill not far from them were two buildings. She could not see more than outlines of them. Above them the sky was clear and full of stars, distant and bright, but behind the trees the horizon was beginning to turn gray.

What is this place? Wanda asked the Ghost.

You know it.

Wanda began to walk through the deep snow, feeling it getting caught on the hem of her bathrobe. She went towards the buildings up the side of the hill. Something about them seemed familiar. Something about them seemed wrong. The closer she got to the buildings, the better she recognized them…

She looked behind her at the Ghost. It stood where she had left it, solemn and unmoving. It would not follow her nor lead her.

Wanda continued to walk forward. She went to one of the larger buildings, which had clearly once been a house. The porch and the roof were collapsed, the walls blackened, the windows broken. It had been burned to a charred shell. The space in front where the driveway should have been was covered with thick snow--it hadn’t been cleared all winter. No one lived here anymore. The house was not liveable. But it was the Bartons’ farmhouse, she would have known it anywhere. But what had happened here?

She could no longer tell if she was in a dream of if she had come home and this had really happened. The porch of the farmhouse was broken up, so she could not walk inside. She could not see past the walls. She could not feel the minds of other people inside of it.

“Laura?” she called. All she heard was the echo of her own voice. She stood at the bottom porch step and looked up. The wind gave a low moan as it moved around the charred ruins. “Clint? Natasha?”

Wanda walked around the edge of the house, looking around, feeling around with her mind. There had to be someone here. Why else would the Ghost have brought her here? She started to make her way towards the barn.

“Clint? Cooper? Lila? Nathaniel?” There were no animals nearby. Laura’s chicken coop had been demolished, by something or someone. The woods nearby were empty. There weren’t even any birds. “Clint? Natasha?”

Wanda walked between the shed and the barn. The smaller shed had been leveled to the ground, burned as well. The barn was partway standing: the other part looked as though it had been blasted away. Wanda went to the barn and looked inside. The tractor was gone. Clint’s tools were lying on the ground, some of them covered in snow and ice. 

Wanda felt the hair on her arms and legs prickling from the cold. The ends of her toes had the beginnings of frostbite.

Clearly she didn’t know this farm very well. If there were people here, she thought to herself, they would be hiding somewhere. Clint would have a place for them to stay safe…  
Wanda walked around to the back side of the barn where the wall was still standing, and she saw something terrible. She thought at first it was blood, but on closer inspection it turned out to be paint. It was the symbol of Hydra. the skull with tentacles within a ring, painted in red on the side of the ruined barn. 

Wanda backed away. She turned around, half-expecting to see the Ghost watching her--anyone behind her, really. But she was still alone.

“Clint!” she shouted more loudly. She began to walk around the barn to the edge of the trees. Part of the fence behind it had fallen down. “Clint! Laura! Cooper!” There was nothing in the woods. Wanda continued her way around the barn. “Nathaniel! Baby Nate! Where are you?”

She looked around at the deserted field. No one responded to the sound of her voice. “Laura! Natasha! Lila!” Wanda’s feet were so cold she felt like she couldn’t walk another step. She looked at the edge of the trees for the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, for the one sign that this horrible scenario was just an illusion. She did not see it.

Maybe it had gone into the woods. Wanda began to walk quickly through the snow across the field, crossing the tracks she had already made. Maybe it was still a dream. Maybe if she made it back to where she had come from, she would wake up, and it would be over. Her feet were cold and wet and she was shaking all over. She wanted nothing more than to find someplace warm and dry, but there was nowhere to go, nowhere to turn--

She had nearly reached the center of the empty field when she heard a noise. It was like a quiet explosion, directly above her head. There was a flash of blue light. She looked up. She saw a hole opening up in space, tearing away the stars. Large, monstrous shapes began to come through it: space creatures like the kind that had invaded New York City. Strucker had kept dead specimens of them in his castle. But these were alive. There was fire in their eyes, they opened their mouths and roared and Wanda could feel their hot breath. One of them was coming directly down into the field towards her. They all were. But the one in the lead grinned at her, bearing rows of serrated teeth. 

Wanda ran towards the trees. She saw a tall, shadowy figure standing on the edge of the wood. It was the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come. It moved, pointing the edge of its scythe towards her, barring her way. Wanda heard a sound above her, a sound that filled the terrible silence, a hungry growl of a space monster about to devour her…

 

She knocked into something solid, and she screamed. Then the solid thing collapsed into a pile of snow. Wanda sat up and looked around her, wildly. The house was intact, the barn and shed were still standing. She had just crashed into one of the snowmen--the Rey one, to be exact. She had bruised her leg running into the staff. The sky behind the trees was going from gray to pink and there were no aliens.

She didn’t know whether to be relieved or upset. She felt wet all over her skin and clothes, as though she had gone for a quick dip in the shower fully clothed. Her hair was covered with a net of droplets but not soaked. She heard birds singing in the distance. She was awake. But she was in the middle of the Bartons’ field. She had just knocked down a snowman. She saw a set of footprints leading from the house and around the barn, but nothing to indicate someone going to the house. The driveway was clear, the cars were parked, and a thin trail of smoke was rising from the chimney. Clint Barton’s family and Natasha were safely inside, asleep.

Had it been a dream? Was all of it real, or just parts of it?

Wanda stood up and began to trudge back to the house. Cold as she was, she was too tired to hurry. She walked up the porch steps and shook off her pajama bottoms and bathrobe.

The door was unlocked. Strange.

Wanda walked into the house and locked the door behind her with her powers. She was tempted to go into the living room to stoke the fire, but she didn’t want to peek at the Christmas presents yet. So she went straight up the stairs. 

In her and Natasha’s bedroom, Natasha was still dozing peacefully. Wanda grabbed a blanket from her side of the bed and went to sit by the window.

She felt her late brother’s presence come to her.

Are you all right?

What just happened? Did you see?

No, I didn’t. All I know is you went downstairs and somehow got outside. You may have fallen asleep on the couch.

Or I might have been abducted by a ghost. Either way.

What did they show you?

Wanda hurriedly reviewed in her mind the scenes that the Ghosts of Christmas Present and Future had shown her. Pietro could see them. 

Do you know if there is any truth to what I saw in that last vision?

I don’t know, Pietro told her. I wish I could say. But the dead don’t always know the future.

Pietro’s spirit stayed close to Wanda. From the window, Wanda saw the horizon turning orange and yellow and then the sun coming up over the trees. Right around sunrise, she heard noises coming from Clint and Laura’s bedroom. She heard baby Nate crying and Laura’s voice soothing him. Then she felt the minds of Cooper and Lila awakening--sweet Lila! Dear Cooper! how she loved them!

A beam of sunlight shot through the window into the bedroom and Natasha rolled over to block it out. But then she blinked and saw Wanda sitting by the window. She sat up.

“How are you awake already?” Natasha asked groggily.

Wanda wasn’t sure how to answer that. They heard footsteps in the hallway and Clint entered the room, wearing flannel pajamas.

“Hey, is there life in here?”

“Nice jammies, Barton,” said Natasha. 

“Shut up, Romanoff. Well, the kids are awake,” he addressed them both. “It’s Christmas morning. The presents have waited long enough.”

Natasha sat up and groaned. “Can’t we wait a little longer?”

“Nope. It’s going to be a nice, sunny day, the kids are going to want to be out in it as much as possible.” 

Natasha grumpily pulled aside her covers and got out of bed. Clint lingered in the doorway and watched Wanda as she followed her downstairs, still wrapped in the blanket. She   
noticed that he thought she looked like she hadn’t slept well, but he decided against asking her how she was.

Cooper and Lila ran down the stairs after them, followed by Laura carrying the baby. Nate had not wanted to wake up and was leaning on her shoulder ready to go to back to sleep without the slightest regard for his first Christmas. But Cooper and Lila stopped at the bottom of the stairs and gasped and the presents set out on the couch for them. Leaning on the wall next to the tree were two brand-new plastic sleds, each wrapped with a large ribbon.

“Real sleds! We can go sledding!” Lila shouted, jumping up and down. 

Cooper ran to one of the sleds and began to pull the ribbon off. “This one’s mine,” he said. Clint went over to help him take off the ribbon. Lila went to grab the other sled. Laura was bouncing the baby up and down. Natasha plugged in the Christmas tree lights. Wanda set some wood in the fireplace and started a fire with her powers. 

“Look, Mommy!” said Lila, running across the room to the side table. “Santa Claus ate all of our Christmas cookies we set out, and he drank the milk all gone, too!” 

Laura walked over to the side table and took the plate. “You’re right, it’s empty.” Wanda saw Laura and Clint exchange glances. They and Natasha had eaten three of the cookies left on the plate last night, but there had been three remaining when they went to bed. Clint had meant during the night to come down and finish them off but never did. No one had touched the milk, either. 

“So!” said Natasha, clapping her hands once, “shall we start digging under the tree?”

“Yes, let’s get this over with,” said Clint.

“Not so loud, Clint,” said Natasha. 

Laura took the empty plate and glass to the kitchen while Natasha and Clint and Wanda started distributing presents. Natasha told Lila to wait until they were all passed out but as soon as Lila got her hands on one of the parcels addressed to her from Auntie Nat she ripped it open. Laura came back to the living room to sit on the couch with the baby, and she opened his presents for him, saving her own for last. 

The first present that Clint opened was the bathrobe Natasha had ordered from J.C. Penny’s. It was a fuzzy navy blue and Clint immediately liked how soft it was. 

“Nat, this is beautiful. Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it, Barton,” said Natasha. “It would’ve been a lot cheaper to send you a box of coal.”

Natasha handed Wanda a package that was signed to her from Coulson. It turned out to be the last two Harry Potter books in paperback. She couldn’t help laughing.

“He is too generous,” said Wanda, covering her mouth with her hands. “He barely knows me.”

“Yes, well, he likes being nice to people,” said Natasha.

Baby Nate got lots of toys. Laura loved both of the onesies that Natasha and Wanda had picked for him. The winner, however, was a precious snowman onesie sent from Clint’s relatives George and Jean Bridger (Wanda didn’t say this to anyone but she knew they could have scarcely afforded it). Cooper got an impressive set of Disney Infinity figures, including several Star Wars characters. The overwhelming majority of presents that Lila received were clothes from her aunties, but she hugged them both warmly and thanked them, especially after she opened her new Elsa dress. She put it on right away over her pajamas.

“So sweet, darling,” Wanda told her.

Some of the clothes that Natasha and Wanda had bought on their shopping spree turned up. For Natasha, Wanda gave a crocheted black infinity scarf with tassels and sequins tied to it. Laura was very impressed with this. Natasha also received a sequined red blouse. Wanda opened her box from Natasha and found a black denim jacket and a red turtleneck sweater dress with an attached belt. 

“Very cute,” Laura commented. 

As the presents were opened, Clint stuffed the discarded wrapping paper and tissue and whatever else was flammable into the open fireplace. 

“Not so much at once, honey, you’ll set off the fire alarm,” said Laura after Clint had shoved in a large wad of wrapping paper.

“You think?” he asked.

“Well, if it does go off, Wanda can fix it,” said Natasha. “I’ve burned stuff cooking in our apartment and she’s saved me a headache a few times. She turns off the fire alarm with her powers.”

“Natasha, please,” said Wanda. Wanda looked around at the living room. All of the presents were scattered around and getting piled up to be taken back upstairs. It had ended so quickly. The literal hours of shopping and wrapping presents had been undone in less than twenty minutes. Something in the back of Wanda’s mind--some part of the cynical, critical person she had been before her brother’s death--made her want to shake her head at the wastefulness of Americans. 

“All right, kids,” Clint announced, waking Wanda from her reverie, “the hard part’s over, but the day is just beginning. Who wants to go sledding?”

“Me!” shouted Cooper and Lila at once. 

“All right,” said Natasha, “let’s get everything upstairs and put away and then get dressed so we can go outside.”

Baby Nate had gone back to sleep. Laura stayed on the couch and rocked him while Natasha and Clint helped gather up the presents. 

Wanda sat for a minute and thought. Clint’s words had stuck out to her: Christmas Day was just beginning. It wasn’t over yet. She had a whole day ahead of her to be with the people she loved more than anyone in the world. 

Wanda stood up and picked up some of the clothes that Lila had left behind and a game character that Cooper had dropped--it was Princess Leia. Wanda couldn’t help but be reminded of how Hillary had dressed for the Star Wars premiere and wondered briefly if she was doing all right this morning.

“Wanda,” Laura said from the couch. “Thank you. For everything.”

“It was my pleasure, Laura,” said Wanda. Wanda went upstairs to Lila’s room. Natasha was in there trying to fold up Lila’s new clothes.

“Auntie Nat, are you going to come sledding with us?” Lila asked.

“No, I’m afraid I can’t,” said Natasha. “I was going to help your mother make Christmas dinner. But I’ll go sledding with you another day, all right?”

“All right,” said Lila. 

“I will go outside with you, Lila, all right?” said Wanda

“Yay!”

The family went back downstairs for a breakfast of hot pancakes with maple syrup. Afterwards, Wanda went to her room and got dressed in some warm clothes. It felt good to be wearing socks instead of having bare feet. When she came out, Clint was on the landing waiting for her, and he’d gotten dressed as well.

“Hey,” said Clint.

“Merry Christmas,” said Wanda. 

“Same to you--did you sleep okay last night?” he asked. 

“What? Er, yes I did.”

“Oh really? I was awake earlier this morning and I heard someone coming through the front door.”

“You heard? I mean, you heard something?”

“Were you sleepwalking?” Clint asked.

“What makes you say that?”

“I looked out my window this morning and I saw tracks crossing the field heading away from the house. And one of the snowmen got knocked over.”

“Oh--well, people who sleepwalk don’t normally go outside, do they?”

“Unless they weren’t actually asleep.” Clint Barton wasn’t easily fooled.

“Look, Clint, I would rather not talk about it,” said Wanda. “These things are difficult to believe--and to understand, even for me.”

“I know. But you’re talking to a guy who used to work with the Avengers, who had a Jedi for an adopted cousin and who’s fought off armies of aliens and robots. Keep it to yourself if you want. But if you wanna talk to me, go right ahead. I’ll listen.” Clint turned away from her and headed down the stairs. 

Wanda followed a few seconds after. A part of her wondered if she should tell Clint. If there was something bad coming that would affect him and the Avengers, didn’t he have the right to know it? But, she reasoned, it was Christmas. There was no reason to give him something to worry about. If last night’s experience was anything like the other dreams she’d had, maybe there was nothing to worry about. 

Natasha had already gone back downstairs to help Laura in the kitchen. Wanda went down to the entryway to put on her borrowed coat and other winter gear. Clint had already gone outside with the older children. She could hear Lila complaining across the field about the demolished snowman. 

You know, a familiar voice said to her mind, you should tell him about your dreams. He is as anxious as the other Avengers to protect the world. Just because he’s not actively fighting doesn’t mean he has less of a stake.

The last time I showed someone what they feared, said Wanda, we nearly destroyed the world. I know better than to make that mistake again.

You know I’m twelve minutes older than you.

That has nothing to do with it. She smirked. She was sure he was smirking back at her from wherever he was standing. Clint had taken Cooper and Lila to the side of the hill near the edge of the trees and was sliding down with Lila on one of the sleds.

If anything happens, she said partly to herself, then I will deal with it. 

Suit yourself. 

Well, nothing bad is going to happen today, Wanda said mentally. I’m going to be spending time with my new family. 

And I’ll be with you.

Of course.

“Merry Christmas, Pietro,” Wanda said aloud quietly. And she went outside. 

 

He was lying awake on the blacktop, staring up at the cloudy sky, wondering if he’d slept at all the previous night. 

A heat wave had come through the southeastern United States, making things unseasonably warm even for that region. So he hadn’t been suffering with the cold. No, just hunger. And nightmares. And loneliness. All the things that came with living alone.

But he knew he could never go back. Not after what Hydra had done to Grace. To him.

There was a slight breeze going through the alleyway where he was. He supposed he should get up and start looking for something to eat, the sooner the better to relieve the pangs in his stomach. Yet he didn’t want to get up. Nightmares like the one he’d had last night always immobilized him. He felt like he could just lie down on that pavement where he was and die. He wanted to. Just die and forget everything--forget Hydra, forget Steve Rogers, forget Grace Porter, Hillary Tanner, Arizona--everything.

It hurt worse to think about the people who loved him. They were probably worried sick about him. But it was better this way. If no one knew where he was, then no one could find him or hurt him. The further he got away from the ones he cared about, the safer they would be. The Tanners would forget him and go on with their lives, and he would...he didn’t care about the outcome for himself.

He finally sat up, slowly. He curled his arms around his legs and bent his head onto his knees. Every part of his body ached, not just physically but emotionally. He could barely string two thoughts together but the words he could think of were mostly no, not ready, I can’t, I won’t, don’t make me, I’m too tired, I don’t want to, no, no, no...He was ashamed of himself. Where had his motivation gone? True, he still got up every day and went through the motions of trying to find something to eat and find a place to hide, but he didn’t care any more about why he did it.

He could hear noises in the background--cars in the not-too-distant streets honking, birds chirping, the wind rustling the trash laying around him on the blacktop. 

But then he thought he could discern a faint ringing. He strained his ears for a moment and held still as he listened. He thought hard, trying to place the sound. It was familiar. Bells, it was the sound of bells ringing. Maybe there was a church nearby. Maybe it was more than one church.

The sound of the bells grew faintly louder. The noise made him think. It had been early November when he had left New Mexico. It was December now. Of course he had lost track of the date, but he wondered if today was Christmas?

It didn’t matter, really. To a homeless man with no place to go, it was just another day.

He tried really hard not to think about where he had been a year ago--in a comfortable, warm home with a nice family and lots of food to eat and presents--no, he couldn’t. None of that belonged in his life anymore. He really must get up and start looking for food, he told himself--a paltry Christmas dinner made out of the scraps of people’s garbage. 

Maybe today he would risk being seen in public and go to a shelter for something to eat. The idea was tempting--but no, he couldn’t. Hydra could have traced him to that city by now. He would be spotted right away. Or S.H.I.E.L.D. would have someone on the lookout for him at any place he tried to get a bite to eat or a place to sleep. It wasn’t worth it. Not even for Christmas.

Christmas was for people who mattered. People like him didn’t matter. He’d learned that much from a year of trying to fit in. He rested his forearms on his knees, his good hand rubbing the wrist of his metal arm--no one was around to recognize it. 

That was when he heard it--a chirp or a sort of whistle coming from above him. He looked up. On a cable stretched between two buildings sat a large, strange bird. It had to be some kind of bird of prey, an owl, judging by the shape. It was white with mottled black markings all over its body and two golden eyes that stared down at him. This bird didn’t belong in a big city, much less in a place this far south.

But she knew who he was. He could see that in her eyes. And suddenly as though a light had turned on he could sense the thoughts and feelings of another mind less complex than his--the owl’s. She had been sent to find him, by people who loved and cared about him. She was a messenger. But she hadn’t brought anything for him, had she? No. But her presence was enough.

Suddenly he was reminded of something. At the Halloween party just days before Grace’s death there had been a guy there dressed as a boy wizard named Harry Potter. And on this shoulder he’d had a stuffed owl, a white one--

“Hedwig.” His mouth moved as he barely whispered the name.

The owl chirped at him. She spread her wings and flapped away.

He rose to his feet, but the owl had vanished from sight before he could start to follow her.


End file.
